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http://www.archive.org/details/jollybeggarscantOOburn 


THE   JOLLY    BEGGARS 


ROBERT    BURNS 


The  world  of  Chaucer  is  fairer,  richer, 
more  significant  than  that  of  Burns ;  but 
■when  the  largeness  and  freedom  of  Burns 
gets  full  sweep,  as  in  Tarn  o'  Shanter,  or 
still  more  in  that  puissant  and  splendid  pro- 
duction, The  Jolly  Beggars,  his  world  may 
be  what  it  will,  his  poetic  genius  triumphs 
over  it.  In  the  world  of  The  Jolly  Beggars 
there  is  more  than  hideousness  and  squalor, 
there  is  bestiality  ;  yet  the  piece  is  a  superb 
poetic  success.  It  has  a  breadth,  truth,  and 
power  which  make  the  famous  scene  in  Auer- 
bach's  Cellar,  of  Goethe's  Faust,  seem  artifi- 
cial and  tame  beside  it,  and  which  are  only 
matched  by  Shakespeare  and  Aristophanes. 

MATTHEW    ARNOLD. 


"-*HE  JOLLY  BEGGARS 
A  CANTATA  BY  ROBERT  BURNS 
WITH  INTRODUCTION  BY 
WILLIAM     MARION     REEDY 


Portland  Maine:  Printed  for  Thomas  Bird  Mosher 

and  published  by  him  at  45  Exchange  Street 

MDCCCCXI V 


COPYRIGHT 

THOMAS   BIRD   MOSHER 

I914 


tiinj 


DEDICATION 


EAR   W.    IRVING   WAY  : 

L  recall  the  fact  that  our  late  never- 
to-be-forgotten  Andrew  Lang  inscribed 
his  exquisite  Letters  on  Literature  to 
you  in  i88q,  just  twenty-five  years  ago.  He 
said  he  had  never  seen  you,  but  I  have  seen 
you  —  and  still  survive !  He  also  remarked 
that  you  were  very  real  to  him,  and  so  you  are 
to  me.  Lastly,  he  affirmed  that  you  had  done 
him  many  kindnesses.  This,  too,  I  can  well 
believe,  for  have  you  not  done  them  unto  me? 
Now,  as  some  slight  return  for  the  friendly 
deeds  oj  many  years  L  ask  your  acceptance  oj 
a  Dedication  to  The  Jolly  Beggars — the  first 
American  and  certainly  the  first  State  of  Maine 
edition,  so  far  as  L  am  able  to  discover,  issued 


DEDICATION 


by  and /or  itself  alone.  It  is  "  noble  and  nude 
and  antique.'1'1  It  is  also  a  world  classic  that 
aligns  with  the  Greater  Testament  of  Master 
Francis  Villon.  lastly  it  should  be  compared  in 
its  first  "beggarly  disguise  as  to  paper  and 
print,  but  magnificent  vesture  of  verse"  with  that 
masterpiece  of  "  old  Friz's,"  for  whose  fair  fame 
we  have  each  of  us  been  laborers  in  the  vineyard. 
May  I  not  affirm  of  the  1 'enters ''-like  fidelity 
illumining  The  Jolly  Beggars,  what  Mtlton 
in  his  Doctrine  and  Discipline  of  Divorce 
said  of  Truth  itself:  — ".  .  .  .  for  truth  is 
as  impossible  to  be  soiled  by  any  outtvard 
touch,  as  the  sunbeam,  though  this  ill  hap 
wait  on  her  nativity  that  she  never  comes  into 
the  world  but  like  a  bastard  to  the  ignominy 
of  him  that  brought  her  forth."  So  stand 
recorded  the  words  of  one  whose  appeal  lay  to 
Time  the  Avenger,  and  most  literally  true  are 
such  words  when  applied  to  the  immortal  serio- 
comic Cantata  which  first  saw  the  light  in  a 
diminutive   '■chap'  long  since   become  priceless. 


DEDICATION 


As  we  know,  it  was  rejected  "  on  principle"  by 
the  earliest  editor  of  our  poefs  collected  works, 
iiprim  Currie,  of  now  seldom  blessed  memory" 
and,  the  insult  being  repeated,  Sir  Walter  Scott 
filed  his  everlasting  rejoinder. 

It  is  a  man's  book :  and  it  became  the  whole 
world's  book  when  he  who  wrote  it  was 

"...  gathered  to  the  kings  of  thought 
Who  waged  contention  with  their  time's  decay, 
And  of  the  past  are  all  that  cannot  pass  away." 

I  offer  this  "  puissant  and  splendid  production  " 
in  a  fashion  that  seems  good  to  me  and  as  I  hope 
will  also  be  approved  by  your  honoured  self. 
It  our  friend, 

THOMAS    BIRD    MOSHER. 
November,  igi4. 


The  Jolly  Beggars,  a  poem  which  stands  alone  in 
literature,  not  only  unmatched,  but  unmatchable.  The 
vagabonds  in  Poosie-Nansie's  ought  to  be  miserable, 
for  they  are  outlaws  and  outcasts.  They  are  social 
outlaws  and  religious  outcasts.  They  are  not  merely 
in  revolt  against  the  laws  and  conventions  of  society. 
For  them  the  laws  and  conventions  of  society  do  not 
exist.  They  do  not  live  in  the  world  we  live  in. 
They  live  in  the  kingdom  of  humor,  where  the  soul  is 
a  joke  and  the  body  is  a  jest.  The  menace  of  laws  spir- 
itual and  laws  social  does  not  terrify  them.  They  are 
satisfied  with  life  as  a  skylark  is  satisfied  with  it  or  a 
pig.  The  very  fact  that  they  are  alive  is  all  they  care 
for.  They  look  neither  before  nor  after.  They  do  not 
pine  for  what  is  not. 

JAMBS   DOUGLAS. 


5131 

^^fe^^^^^^^i:^^^ 

CONTENTS 

PAGE 

DEDICATION  :    TO  W.  IRVING  WAY 

V 

BY  THE   EDITOR 

INTRODUCTION             .... 

.    xiii 

BY  WILLIAM  MARION  REEDY 

THE  JOLLY  BEGGARS :    A  CANTATA 

•       3 

BY  ROBERT  BURNS 

NOTES  ON  TEXT          .... 

.     27 

BIBLIOGRAPHY              .... 

.     29 

comments  :  (not  "  writ  in  water  "  ) 

i.  Sir  Walter  Scott  (1809) 

•     35 

11.  J.  G.  Lockhart  (1828) 

•     38 

in.  Thomas  Carlyle  (1828) 

•     39 

iv.  William  Scott  Douglas  (189 1) 

•     4i 

v.  William  Ernest  Henley  (1896) 

•     44 

vi.  Andrew  Lang  (1886-1896)  . 

•     49 

SOME  ASPECTS  OF  ROBERT  BURNS 

•     53 

BY  ROBERT  LOUIS  STEVENSON 

CONTENTS 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

frontispiece:  photogravure  of  the  nasmyth 
portrait 

i.     facsimile  of   title-page  first  edition, 

GLASGOW  (1799) 

II.  FACSIMILE    OF    LAST    PAGE    OF   BURNS'    MS. 
FROM    LITHOGRAPHED    EDITION    (1823) 

III.  ORIGINAL  AIR  OF  FINAL  SONG 


INTRODUCTION 


Pupil  of  Ramsay,  master  of  Tannahill,  it  is  natural 
that  Chloris  and  Damon  should  linger  in  his  pages 
beside  Jean  and  Gavin  and  Davie,  and  the  beggars  at 
Nanse's  splore.  Everyone  of  judgment  sees  that  his 
most  underived  and  passionate  work  was  his  best,  that 
his  fame  rests  most  firmly  on  the  records  of  his  wildest 
or  freest  moods ;  more  on  the  Songs  and  the  Satires 
and  Tam  o'Shanter  and  the  Cantata  than  on  the 
Cotter's  Saturday  Night 

Contrast  The  Gentle  Shepherd  with  The  Jolly  Beg- 
gars—  the  one  is  a  court  pastoral,  like  a  minuet  of  the 
ladies  of  Versailles  on  the  sward  of  the  Swiss  village 
near  the  Trianon,  the  other  is  like  the  march  of  the 
Mcenads  with  Theroigne  de  Mericourt.  Over  all  this 
masterpiece  is  poured  "a  flood  of  liquid  harmony:" 
in  the  acme  of  the  two-edged  satire,  aimed  alike  at 
laws  and  law-breakers,  the  graceless  crew  are  raised 
above  the  level  of  gipsies,  footpads,  and  rogues,  and 
made,  like  Titans,  to  launch  their  thunders  of  rebel- 
lion against  the  world. 

WILLIAM  SCOTT   DOUGLAS. 


INTRODUCTION 


DURNS    was    twenty-seven   when    he 
J  wrote    "  The    Jolly    Beggars."      The 
j  J  year  was  1785.     And  there  we  have, 
aside  from  his  genius,  the  explanation 
of  his  remarkable  performance. 

For  the  work  is,  first,  the  authentic,  the 
insuppressible  utterance  of  youth  —  youth  that 
believes  in  itself,  in  its  power  to  make  all 
things  anew  ;  youth  that  has  no  reverence  for 
custom,  or  tradition  or  institutions.  So  it  is 
the  mocking  spirit  of  youth  that  calls  the 
piece  "  a  cantata,"  in  scorn  of  all  the  religious 
connotations  of  the  word.  It  is  the  same 
spirit  as  asserts  itself  in  the  treatment  of 
"Holy  Willie,"  of  the  "Unco  Guid."  Youth 
is  infidel.     It  is  so  sure  of  itself,  it  has  no 


INTRODUCTION 


faith  in  aught  else  that  is  established.  Against 
what  is,  youth  revolts.  So  the  description, 
"  a  cantata,"  is  a  fling  at  religion,  of  which  we 
know  from  Burns'  biography  he  had  had  a 
disillusioning  experience.  Not  long  before, 
he  tells  us,  he  was  in  danger  of  being  over- 
pious.  But  he  had  read  and  he  had  thought, 
and  after  the  manner  of  youth,  he  had  found 
his  soul  turn  sick  within  him  in  contemplation 
of  religion  gone  all  to  formalism,  emptied  of 
substance  of  love.  For  the  world  just  then 
was  seething  with  the  stirring  of  the  Enlight- 
enment. The  Encyclopaedists,  Rousseau,  and 
others  had  set  the  leaven  working.  America 
had  successfully  rebelled.  The  French  Revolu- 
tion was  impending.  The  world  was  about  to 
revert  to  that  "state  of  nature"  Jean  Jacques 
had  poetized  and  idealized. 

What  was  youth  to  do  under  the  impulse  of 
the  new  vision  ?  Nothing  but  fling  itself  into 
the  new  movement.  Man  was  born  free  but 
is  everywhere  in  chains.     The  world  was  in 


INTRODUCTION 


xv 


the  grasp  of  the  oppressors.  Youth's  heart 
went  out  and  its  song  went  up  for  the  outcast, 
the  lawless.  For  Burns  was  of  the  people. 
He  was  of  the  oppressed.  Society,  as  he  saw 
it,  is  pictured  in  the  "Twa  Dogs." 

Moreover,  experience  had  begun  to  touch 
him  with  bitterness  at  Mauchline,  and  he  had 
had  experience  of  love  that  made  him  a  rebel 
against  the  supreme  oppressive  mystery  of 
high  heaven  that  defeats  love  in  the  ultimate. 
The  storm  and  stress  of  life  and  love  were 
upon  him  and  he  was  seeking  reality.  The 
conventions  hemmed  him  in  and  tortured  him. 
The  ideal  was  far  away.  The  ideals  of  this 
world  were  false  to  him.  To  the  winds,  then, 
with  the  wisdom  of  this  world  as  represented 
by  the  successful  whom  he  knew,  with  religion 
as  represented  by  the  "Auld  LichtsI"  There 
was  escape  and  surcease  at  Poosie  Nansie's. 
So,  many  a  lesser  Burns  has  fled  to  —  Bohemia. 
For  there  are  the  people  who  are  real,  having 
abandoned    conformity,    having    taken    their 


INTRODUCTION 


lives  in  their  own  hands  for  living.  There  is 
to  be  found  life  unconditioned  by  any  law. 
There  one  finds  those  who  acknowledge  no 
fealty  to  duty,  who  are  emancipated  of  servi- 
tude to  things  —  to  property.  Love  is  free, 
and  drink  is  there  to  give  glamour  to  all. 
And  there  's  boundless,  unquestioning  friend- 
ship among  all  in  a  republic  of  those  who  live 
while  they  live  and  laugh  at  all  the  insane 
devices  of  order.  All  this  is  youth  at  its  best 
—  in  the  time  of  folly  and  revolt.  No  wonder 
Burns  found,  for  a  time,  what  he  thought  to 
be  a  more  real  world  among  the  Jolly  Beggars. 
And  who  can  fault  him  for  it  ?  It  is  nature 
in  the  young.  It  is  the  course  of  things.  It 
has  its  use  developmentally.  "The  follies  of 
youth,"  says  Robert  Louis  Stevenson,  "have 
a  basis  in  sound  reason,  just  as  much  as  the 
embarrassing  questions  sometimes  put  by 
young  children.  Their  most  anti-social  acts 
indicate  the  defects  of  our  society.  When 
the  torrent  sweeps  the  man  against  the  boulder, 


INTRODUCTION 


you  must  expect  him  to  scream,  and  you  need 
not  be  surprised  if  the  scream  is  sometimes  a 
theory.  It  is  better  to  be  a  fool  than  to  be 
dead.  It  is  better  to  emit  a  scream  in  the 
shape  of  a  theory  than  to  be  entirely  insensible 
to  the  jars  and  incongruities  of  life  and  take 
everything  as  it  comes  in  a  forlorn  stupidity. 
For  God's  sake,  give  me  the  young  man  who 
has  brains  enough  to  make  a  fool  of  himself." 
Divine  folly !  What  a  wealth  of  music  and 
of  wisdom  the  world  owes  to  it.  Without  it 
we  had  no  Villon.  And  how  much  of  Shak- 
spere  do  we  owe  to  nights  of  bowsing  at  the 
Mermaid,  with  blustering  Ben.  We  sense  it 
in  the  work  of  Jean  Bocace,  it  echoes 
resoundingly  in  Byron.  Out  of  its  fume  and 
plangency  came  the  sombre  imaginings  of  Poe 
and  the  piercingly  simple  spiritualities  of 
Verlaine.  Wine  and  woman  and  song!  Are 
they  not  a  trinity  of  the  world  in  revolt  against 
the  tyranny  of  rules,  acclaimed  by  Doctor 
Martin   Luther  ?     Search  me  the   world   and 


INTRODUCTION 


find  a  truer  reformer  than  Master  Francis 
Rabelais,  escaped  at  forty  from  a  monastery 
and  seeing  the  world  with  the  eyes  of  youth 
till  then  unfelt,  unknown.  Thus  supreme  art 
comes  through  and  from  the  humanizing  touch 
of  the  people.  Burns  perfected,  yes,  and 
purified,  his  philosophy  at  Poosie  Nansie's. 

How  he  came  to  write  "The  Jolly  Beggars," 
thus  we  see.  To  explain  the  poem  itself  were 
fatuous.  A  great  work  explains,  as  it  pro- 
claims, itself.  But  it  is  not  supererogatory  to 
point  out  that  here  is  Burns  at  high-water- 
mark. Note  the  inclusiveness  of  his  observa- 
tion. He  paints  like  Teniers.  You  see,  you 
hear,  you  smell  the  room  and  the  company. 
You  plunge  from  the  outer  blast  into  the  back 
room's  cosy  glow,  into  the  midst  of  the  carouse. 
Every  character  is  drawn  to  the  life  and 
painted  nature's  own  hue  in  a  stroke,  in  a 
dash.  The  fiddle  squeaks  and  the  soldier 
sings.  And  as  the  soldier  sings,  he  indicts 
War  in  a  jest.     He  has  lost  an  arm  and  a  leg 


INTRODUCTION 


and  yet  he  's  ready  to  go  again  at  the  sound  of 
the  drum.  He  helped  make  Wolfe  immortal 
"on  the  heights  of  Abram,"  and  to  bring 
Moro  castle  low,  and  now  he  must  beg,  but 
he's  happy  with  his  wallet,  his  bottle  and  his 
callet  —  and  that  is  all  of  Britain's  glory  to 
him.  Then  the  doxy  takes  up  the  song  to  her 
sodjer  laddie  —  the  last  of  a  long  line  of  loves 
she  has  known.  This  is  the  joy  of  living  — 
she  knows  not  how  long  —  a  cup  and  a  song. 
And  old  age  thinks  it  over  and  wonders  if 
that  philosophy  be  not  as  true  as  any  of  the 
others — while  it  lasts.  Merry  Andrew  rises 
for  his  say,  and  where  will  you  find  better 
expressed  the  wisdom  of  the  fool,  flouting  the 
folly  of  the  wise  ?  Here  is  a  fool  by  profes- 
sion, and  it 's  better  than  being  one  and  not 
knowing  it.  There 's  no  wisdom  in  books. 
Government?  Statesmanship!  "There's 
even  I  'm  tauld  i'  the  Court  a  tumbler  ca'd 
the  Premier."  Look !  a  mountebank  in  the 
pulpit!  .  .  .     "The    chiel    that's    a    fool  for 


INTRODUCTION 


himsel  "  —  well,  he  's  wiser  than  those  who  are 
fools  for  others,  or  for  a  conventional  idea. 
Hearken  to  the  ranch  carlin  as  she  sings  her 
"braw  John  Highlandman  ! "  Here's  the 
undying  glorification  of  the  strong  man  who 
defies  the  state  and  the  law.  All  the  world 
loves  a  rebel  —  all  the  world  that  is  not  rotten 
with  the  infatuation  of  property  and  the 
idolatry  of  protecting  it.  The  Fiddler  sings 
us  the  open  road,  the  bed  on  the  heath,  the 
love-clip  in  the  ditch.  Away  with  work,  give 
us  the  free  air,  a  glass,  a  song,  a  kiss,  and 
"  we  '11  whistle  o'er  the  lave  o'  it."  And  the 
Tinker  holds  life  a  gay  adventure,  making  a 
slight  concession  to  labor.  But  the  end  of 
labor  is  to  gain  leisure  and  that 's  why  he  will 
"go  and  clout  the  cauldron."  He's  a  free 
laborer,  is  Messer  Tinker,  nor  slave  to  boss 
nor  to  the  Union.  Here,  in  mocking  guise,  is 
the  philosophy  of  work  :  just  enough  of  it  to 
get  along  short  of  scant  and,  now  and  then,  to 
chousel  the  state  by  a  feat  of  bounty-jumping. 


INTRODUCTION 


The  Poet  joins  in  with  his  lay,  "For  a'  that." 
And  his  theme  is  as  that  of  the  others.  Be 
free.  Enjoy  the  hour.  Follow  fancy,  "but 
for  how  lang  the  flie  may  stang,  let  inclination 
law  that !  "  The  crowd  calls  for  another  song 
from  the  Poet  and  he  gives  them  the  ditty 
with  a  chorus  in  which  we  can  hear  the 
Ca  ira,  to  which  we  can  imagine,  other 
peasants,  a  few  years  later,  dancing  the  car- 
magnole around  the  tumbrils : 

"  A  fig  for  those  by  law  protected ! 

Liberty  's  a  glorious  feast, 
Courts  for  cowards  were  erected, 

Churches  built  to  please  the  priest !  " 


This  is  the  culmination  of  the  theme  of  "  The 
Jolly  Beggars."  It  puts  the  case  for  freedom, 
as  youth  ever  puts  it,  in  the  extreme.  Later 
we  may  come  to  see  that  what  youth  rebels  at 
is  but  the  crust  and  not  the  core  of  life  as  it 
is  lived  in  the  social  contract.  Youth  would 
be    served    with    the    truth.     It   cries  for   it. 


INTRODUCTION 


But  life  cannot  quite  give  the  truth  desired 
lest  that  truth  consume  us  with  a  withering 
flame.     Life  compromises  and  so  must  we. 

But  even  as  we  so  conclude,  who  of  us  is 
not,  in  his  secret  heart,  at  one  with  Burns  in 
loving  life  and  loving  love  and  hacking  at 
chains.  We  are  sib  to  Burns  as  we  are  to 
Don  Quixote.  We  go  on  the  quest  to  destroy 
wrong  and  to  rescue  Beauty.  Yes,  we  know 
we  are  fools,  but  in  such  sweet  folly  who 
would  be  wise  —  and  bitter?  Burns,  in  "The 
Jolly  Beggars,"  is  simply  in  the  indignant,  pro- 
testing, rebellious  phase  of  his  permanent, 
fundamental  mood  of  universal,  democratic 
sympathy.  There  is  naught  here  that  clashes 
with  the  Cotter's  Saturday  Night,  To  a  Mouse, 
To  a  Daisy,  the  verses  to  his  old  mare  or  to 
his  pet  yowe.  Shines  through  the  ribaldry 
ever  nothing  but  love  and  pity  more  powerful 
even  than  his  scorn  for  the  system  that  makes 
the  folk  who  live  for  us,  and  for  all  time,  in 
the   reeking    room   at   Poosie    Nansie's.     For 


INTRODUCTION 


xxm 


they  are  our  brothers  and  sisters.  To  those 
who  sniff  at  these  and  hold  their  nose  for  that 
such  may  come  "  between  the  wind  and  their 
nobility  "  we  can  only  say 

"  Let  them  cant  about  decorum, 
Who  have  character  to  lose." 

WILLIAM    MARION    REEDY. 


THE   JOLLY    BEGGARS 

A   CANTATA 


Of  all  his  poems  perhaps  the  greatest  —  certainly 
the  most  imaginative  —  is  The  Jolly  Beggars.  The 
condition  of  the  characters  in  this  splendid  "  Cantata  " 
is  in  one  respect  akin  to  that  in  which  the  discoverer 
of  the  "  Everlasting  No "  imagined  that  he  might 
ultimately  find  himself.  Tfcey  have  sounded  to  the 
bottom  every  possibility  of  disaster  and  humiliation  ; 
life  can  bring  to  them  no  evil  of  which  they  have  not 
had  the  most  intimate  experience.  The  conclusion 
they  draw  is  not  in  the  least  like  that  drawn  by 
Teufelsdrockh  —  that  man  should  in  this  lowest  of  all 
depths  confront  his  destiny  in  a  spirit  of  grim  defiance. 
Their  creed  is  that  he  should  confront  it  in  a  spirit  of 
reckless  gaiety,  snatching  from  the  universe  the  poor 
fragments  of  pleasure  which  may  still  be  within  his 
reach.  And  so  they  kiss,  and  fight,  and  drink,  and 
sing  their  wild  songs,  and  in  a  whirl  of  mad  excitement 
forget  their  rags,  and  misery,  and  squalor.  There  was 
something  in  the  idea  of  this  poem  which  struck  a 
deep  chord  in  the  mind  of  Burns,  and  called  into  exer- 
cise his  loftiest  powers  as  an  artist.  From  the  first 
line  to  the  last  he  writes  with  unflagging  vigour  and 
with  a  sense  of  boundless  freedom.  He  does  not  once 
attempt  to  tell  us  directly  the  secret  of  the  strange 
scene  he  depicts,  yet  we  are  never  for  a  moment  per- 
mitted to  lose  sight  of  its  tragic  significance. 

JAMBS    SIME. 


TRE 

JOLLY    BEGGARS 


A   CANTATA. 
BY 

ROBERT  BURNS. 


Hcre's  to  budgets,  bags,  and  wallets  f 
Hire's  to  all  the  "wandering  train  / 

Here's  our  ragged  brits  and  C&Ucts' 
One  and  all  cry  wt,  Amen  ! 


GLASGOW: 

PRINTED   FOR    AND  SOLD  BY 

Stewart  &  Melkle. 


I— TITLE-PAGE  OF  FIRST  EDITION  (l7qq) 


THE  JOLLY  BEGGARS 


A   CANTATA 


RECITATIVO 


WHEN  lyart  leaves  bestrow 
the  yird, 
Or,    wavering    like    the 
bauckie-bird,1 
Bedim  cauld  Boreas'  blast ; 
When  hailstanes  drive  wi'  bitter  skyte, 
And  infant  frosts  begin  to  bite, 

In  hoary  cranreuch  drest ; 
Ae  night  at  e'en  a  merry  core 

O'  randie,  gangrel  bodies 
In  Poosie-Nansie's2  held  the  splore, 
To  drink  their  orra  duddies  : 


withered 
ground 


lash 


one  ;  gang 

lawless 
vagrant 

carousal 
spare  rags 


4 

THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 

Wi'  quaffing  and  laughing 

roistered 

They  ranted  an'  they  sang, 

Wi'  jumping  an'  thumping 

The  vera  girdle  rang.3 

next 

ii 
First,  niest  the  fire,  in  auld  red  rags 

Ane  sat,  weel  brac'd  wi'  mealy  bags4 

And  knapsack  a'  in  order; 

His  doxy  lay  within  his  arm  ; 

whisky 

Wi'  usquebae  an'  blankets  warm, 

leered 

She  blinket  on  her  sodger. 

flushed  with 
drink 

An'  ay  he  gies  the  tozie  drab 

sounding 

The  tither  skelpin  kiss, 

mouth 

While  she  held  up  her  greedy  gab 

alms-dish 

Just  like  an  aumous  dish : 

Each 

Ilk  smack  still  did  crack  still 

hawker's 

Like  onie  cadger's  whup ; 

Then,  swaggering  an'  staggering, 

He  roar'd  this  ditty  up  :  — 

THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 


AIR 

tune  :  Soldier  s  Joy 

I 
I  am  a  son  of  Mars,  who  have  been  in  many 
wars, 
And  show  my  cuts  and  scars  wherever   I 
come  : 
This  here  was  for  a  wench,  and  that  other  in  a 
trench 
When  welcoming  the  French  at  the  sound  of 
the  drum. 

Lai  de  daudle,  etc, 

n 
My    prenticeship    I    past,    where    my    leader 
breath'd  his  last, 
When   the   bloody    die    was    cast    on    the 
heights  of  Abram ; 
And  I  served  out  my  trade  when  the  gallant 
game  was  play'd, 
And  the  Moro  low  was  laid  at  the  sound  of 
the  drum. 


THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 


in 


I  lastly  was  with  Curtis  among  the   floating 
batt'ries, 
And  there  I  left  for  witness  an  arm  and  a 
limb  ; 
Yet  let  my  country  need  me,  with  Eliott  to 
head  me 
I'd  clatter  on  my  stumps  at  the  sound  of  the 
drum. 


IV 


trull 


And  now,  tho'  I  must  beg  with  a  wooden  arm 
and  leg 
And  many  a  tatter'd  rag  hanging  over  my 
bum, 
I'm  as  happy  with  my  wallet,  my  bottle,  and 
my  callet 
As    when    I    us'd    in    scarlet    to   follow    a 
drum. 


THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 

7 

V 

What  tho'  with  hoary  locks  I  must  stand  the 

winter  shocks, 

Beneath  the  woods  and  rocks  oftentimes  for 

a  home  ? 

When  the  tother  bag  I  sell,  and  the  tother 

bottle  tell, 

I  could  meet  a  troop  of  Hell  at  the  sound 

of  a  drum. 

Lai  de  daudle,  etc. 

RECITATIVO 

He  ended ;  and  the  kebars  sheuk 

rafters  shook 

Aboon  the  chorus  roar ; 

Over 

While  frighted  rattons  backward  leuk, 

rats 

An'  seek  the  benmost  bore  : 

inmost  hole 

A  fairy  fiddler  frae  the  neuk, 

tiny ;  corner 

He  skirl'd  out  Encore! 

squeaked 

But  up  arose  the  martial  chuck, 

dear 

An'  laid  the  loud  uproar:  — 

THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 


AIR 


tune  :  Sodger  Laddie 


I  once  was  a  maid,  tho'  I  cannot  tell  when, 
And  still  my  delight  is  in  proper  young  men. 
Some  one  of  a  troop  of  dragoons  was  my  daddie : 
No  wonder  I  'm  fond  of  a  sodger  laddie ! 

Sing,  lal  de  dal,  etc. 


The  first  of  my  loves  was  a  swaggering  blade : 
To  rattle  the  thundering  drum  was  his  trade ; 
His  leg  was  so  tight,   and  his  cheek   was  so 

ruddy, 
Transported  I  was  with  my  sodger  laddie. 


in 

But  the  godly  old  chaplain  left  him  in  the  lurch ; 
The  sword  I  forsook  for  the  sake  of  the  church ; 
He  risked  the  soul,  and  I  ventur'd  the  body: 
'Twas  then  I  prov'd  false  to  my  sodger  laddie. 


THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 


IV 

Full  soon  I  grew  sick  of  my  sanctified  sot ; 
The  regiment  at  large  for  a  husband  I  got; 
From  the  gilded  spontoon5  to  the  fife  I  was 

ready : 
I  asked  no  more  but  a  sodger  laddie. 


But  the  Peace  it  reduc'd  me  to  beg  in  despair, 
Till  I  met  my  old  boy  in  a  Cunningham  Fair; 
His  rags  regimental  they  flutter'd  so  gaudy : 
My  heart  it  rejoic'd  at  a  sodger  laddie. 


VI 

And  now  I  have  liv'd  —  I  know  not  how  long  1 
But  still  I  can  join  in  a  cup  and  a  song; 
And  whilst  with  both  hands  I  can  hold  the  glass 

steady, 
Here  's  to  thee,  my  hero,  my  sodger  laddie  ! 
Sing,  lal  de  dal,  etc. 


io 

THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 

RECITATIVO 

Poor  Merry-Andrew  in  the  neuk 

tinker-wench 

Sat  guzzling  wi'  a  tinkler-hizzie  ; 

cared  not ; 
took 

They  mind  't  na  wha  the  chorus  teuk, 

Between  themselves  they  were  sae  busy. 

At  length,  wi'  drink  an'  courting  dizzy, 

struggled 

He  stoiter'd  up  an'  made  a  face ; 

Then  turn'd  an'  laid  a  smack  on  Grizzie, 

Then 

Syne  tun'd  his  pipes  wi'  grave  grimace :  — 

AIR 

tune  :  Auld  Sir  Symon 

drunk 

I 
Sir  Wisdom  's  a  fool  when  he  's  fou; 

court 

Sir  Knave  is  a  fool  in  a  session  : 

He  's  there  but  a  prentice  I  trow, 

But  I  am  a  fool  by  profession. 

book 

ii 
My  grannie  she  bought  me  a  beuk, 

went  off 

An'  I  held  awa  to  the  school : 

I  fear  I  my  talent  misteuk, 

But  what  will  ye  hae  of  a  fool  ? 

THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 

1 1 

in 

For  drink  I  wad  venture  my  neck ; 

A  hizzie  's  the  half  of  my  craft : 

But  what  could  ye  other  expect 

Of  ane  that 's  avowedly  daft  ? 

cracked 

IV 

I  ance  was  tyed  up  like  a  stirk6 

bullock 

For  civilly  swearing  and  quaffing ; 

I  ance  was  abus'd  i'  the  kirk 

rebuked 

For  towsing  a  lass  i'  my  daffin. 

rumpling;  fun 

V 

Poor  Andrew  that  tumbles  for  sport 

Let  naebody  name  wi'  a  jeer : 

There  's  even,  I  'm  tauld,  i'  the  Court 

A  tumbler  ca'd  the  Premier. 

VI 

Observ'd  ye  yon  reverend  lad 

Mak  faces  to  tickle  the  mob  ? 

He  rails  at  our  mountebank  squad  — 

It  's  rivalship  just  i'  the  job ! 

THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 


fellow 


sturdy  beldam 


ducked 


plague  upon 
gallows 


fine 


lowland 


VII 

And  now  my  conclusion  I  '11  tell, 
For  faith  !  I  'm  confoundedly  dry  : 

The  chiel  that 's  a  fool  for  himsel, 
Guid  Lord !  he  's  far  dafter  than  I. 

RECITATIVO 

Then  niest  outspak  a  raucle  carlin, 
Wha  kent  fu'  weel  to  cleek  the  sterling 
For  monie  a  pursie  she  had  hooked,8 
An'  had  in  monie  a  well  been  douked. 
Her  love  had  been  a  Highland  laddie, 
But  weary  fa'  the  waefu'  woodie ! 
Wi'  sighs  an'  sobs  she  thus  began 
To  wail  her  braw?  John  Highlandman:  — 

AIR 

tune  :    O,  An'  \e  Were  Dead',  Guidman 
i 
A  Highland  lad  my  love  was  born, 
The  lalland  laws  he  held  in  scorn, 
But  he  still  was  faithfu'  to  his  clan, 
My  gallant,  braw  John  Highlandman. 


THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 

i3 

CHORUS 

Sing  hey  my  braw  John  Highlandman  ! 

Sing  ho  my  braw  John  Highlandman  ! 

There  's  not  a  lad  in  a'  the  Ian' 

Was  match  for  my  John  Highlandman  ! 

ii 
With  his  philibeg,  an'  tartan  plaid, 

kilt 

An'  guid  claymore10  down  by  his  side, 

The  ladies'  hearts  he  did  trepan, 

My  gallant,  braw  John  Highlandman. 

in 

We  ranged  a'  from  Tweed  to  Spey, 

An'  liv'd  like  lords  an'  ladies  gay, 

For  a  lalland  face  he  feared  none, 

My  gallant,  braw  John  Highlandman. 

IV 

They  banish'd  him  beyond  the  sea, 

But  ere  the  bud  was  on  the  tree, 

Adown  my  cheeks  the  pearls  ran, 

Embracing  my  John  Highlandman. 

14 


THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 


But,  Och  !  they  catch'd  him  at  the  last, 

And  bound  him  in  a  dungeon  fast. 

My  curse  upon  them  every  one  — 

They  've  hang'd  my  braw  John  Highlandman  ! 

VI 

And  now  a  widow  I  must  mourn 
The  pleasures  that  will  ne'er  return  ; 
No  comfort  but  a  hearty  can 
When  I  think  on  John  Highlandman. 

CHORUS 

Sing  hey  my  braw  John  Highlandman  ! 
Sing  ho  my  braw  John  Highlandman  ! 
There  's  not  a  lad  in  a'  the  Ian' 
Was  match  for  my  John  Highlandman  ! 

RECITATIVO 


A  pigmy  scraper  on  a  fiddle, 

Wha  us'd  to  trystes  an'  fairs  to  driddle," 


THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 

i5 

Her  strappin  limb  an'  gawsie  middle 

buxom 

(He  reach'd  nae  higher) 

Had  hol'd  his  heartie  like  a  riddle, 

An'  blawn  't  on  fire. 

blown  it 

II 

Wi'  hand  on  hainch  and  upward  e'e, 

hip 

He  croon'd  his  gamut,  one,  two,  three, 

hummed 

Then  in  an  arioso  key 

The  wee  Apollo 

Set  off  wi'  allegretto  glee 

His  giga  solo  :  — 

AIR 

tune  :    Whistle  Owre  the  Lave  O't 

rest 

I 
Let  me  ryke  up  to  dight  that  tear ; 

reach  ;  wipe 

An'  go  wi'  me  an'  be  my  dear, 

An'  then  your  every  care  an'  fear 

May  whistle  owre  the  lave  o't. 

i6 

THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 

CHORUS 

I  am  a  fiddler  to  my  trade, 

An'  a'  the  tunes  that  e'er  I  play'd, 

The  sweetest  still  to  wife  or  maid 

Was  Whistle  Owre  the  Lave  O't. 

harvesthomes 
we  '11 

ii 
At  kirns  an'  weddins  we  'se  be  there, 

An'  0,  sae  nicely  's  we  will  fare ! 

We  '11  bowse  about  till  Daddie  Care 

Sing  Whistle  Owre  the  Lave  O't. 

in 

bones;  pick 

Sae  merrily  the  banes  we  '11  pyke, 

fence 

An'  sun  oursels  about  the  dyke  ; 

An'  at  our  leisure,  when  ye  like, 

We  '11  —  whistle  owre  the  lave  o't ! 

IV 

But  bless  me  wi'  your  heav'n  o'  charms, 

tickle  ;  catgut 

An'  while  I  kittle  hair  on  thairms, 

such 

Hunger,  cauld,  an'  a'  sic  harms 

May  whistle  owre  the  lave  o't. 

THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 

i7 

CHORUS 

I  am  a  fiddler  to  my  trade, 

An'  a'  the  tunes  that  e'er  I  play'd, 

The  sweetest  still  to  wife  or  maid 

Was  Whistle  Owre  the  Lave  O't. 

RECITATIVO 

Her  charms  had  struck  a  sturdy  caird 

tinker 

As  weel  as  poor  gut-scraper ; 

He  taks  the  fiddler  by  the  beard, 

An'  draws  a  roosty  rapier ; 

rusty 

He  swoor  by  a'  was  swearing  worth 

To  speet  him  like  a  pliver, 

plover 

Unless  he  would  from  that  time  forth 

Relinquish  her  for  ever. 

ii 
Wi'  ghastly  e'e  poor  Tweedle-Dee 

Upon  his  hunkers  bended, 

hams 

An'  pray'd  for  grace  wi'  ruefu'  face, 

An'  sae  the  quarrel  ended. 

so 

THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 


But  tho'  his  little  heart  did  grieve 
When  round  the  tinkler  prest  her, 

He  feign'd  to  snirtle  in  his  sleeve 

When  thus  the  caird  address'd  her  :  — 


AIR 

tune  :    Clout  the  Cauldron 
I 
My  bonie  lass,  I  work  in  brass, 

A  tinkler  is  my  station; 
I  've  travell'd  round  all  Christian  ground 

In  this  my  occupation  ; 
I  've  taen  the  gold,  an'  been  enrolled 

In  many  a  noble  squadron  ; 
But  vain  they  search'd  when  off  I  march'd 

To  go  an'  clout  the  cauldron. 

ii 
Despise  that  shrimp,  that  wither'd  imp, 

With  a'  his  noise  an'  cap'rin, 
An'  take  a  share  wi'  those  that  bear 

The  budget12  and  the  apron  ! 


THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 

l9 

And  by  that  stowp,  my  faith  an'  houpe  ! 

pot 

And  by  that  dear  Kilbaigie  !*s 

If  e'er  ye  want,  or  meet  wi'  scant, 

short  com- 
mons 

May  I  ne'er  weet  my  craigie ! 

wet ;  throat 

• 

RECITATIVO 

I 

The  caird  prevail'd  :  th'  unblushing  fair 

In  his  embraces  sunk, 

Partly  wi'  love  o'ercome  sae  sair, 

An'  partly  she  was  drunk. 

Sir  Violino,  with  an  air 

That  show'd  a  man  o'  spunk, 

spirit 

Wish'd  unison  between  the  pair, 

An'  made  the  bottle  clunk1-* 

To  their  health  that  night. 

ii 
But  hurchin  Cupid  shot  a  shaft, 

urchin 

That  play'd  a  dame  a  shavie : 

trick 

The  fiddler  rak'd  her  fore  and  aft 

Behint  the  chicken  cavie  ; 

hencoop 

20 

THE    JOLLY     BEGGARS 

Her  lord,  a  wight  of  Homer's  craft,  js 

spavin 

Tho'  limpin'  wi'  the  spavie, 

hobbled 
leapt  like  mad 

He  hirpl'd  up,  an'  lap  like  daft, 

offered 

An'  shor'd  them  "  Dainty  Davie  "l6 

gratis 

0'  boot  that  night. 

in 

He  was  a  care-defying  blade 

As  ever  Bacchus  listed  ! 

Tho'  Fortune  sair  upon  him  laid, 

His  heart,  she  ever  miss'd  it. 

He  had  no  wish  but  —  to  be  glad, 

Nor  want  but  —  when  he  thirsted, 

He  hated  nought  but  —  to  be  sad ; 

An'  thus  the  Muse  suggested 

His  sang  that  night. 

AIR 

tune:  For  A'  That,  An'  A'  That 

I 
I  am  a  Bard,  of  no  regard 

Wi'  gentle  folks  an'  a'  that, 

THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 

21 

But  Homer-like  the  glowrin  byke, 

staring  crowd 

Frae  town  to  town  I  draw  that. 

CHORUS 

For  a'  that,  an'  a'  that, 

An'  twice  as  muckle  's  a'  that, 

much 

I  've  lost  but  ane,  I  've  twa  behin', 

I  've  wife  eneugh  for  a'  that. 

n 
I  never  drank  the  Muses'  stank, 

pond 

Castalia's  burn,  an'  a'  that ; 

brook 

But  there  it  streams,  an'  richly  reams  — 

foams 

My  Helicon '7  I  ca'  that. 

in 

Great  love  I  bear  to  a'  the  fair, 

Their  humble  slave  an'  a'  that; 

But  lordly  will,  I  hold  it  still 

A  mortal  sin  to  thraw  that. 

thwart 

22 

THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 

IV 

In  raptures  sweet  this  hour  we  meet 

Wi'  mutual  love  an'  a'  that ; 

fly ;  sting 

But  for  how  lang  the  flie  may  stang, 

Let  inclination  law  that ! 

V 

Their  tricks  an'  craft  hae  put  me  daft, 

They  've  taen  me  in,  an'  a'  that ; 

But  clear  your  decks,  an'  here  's  the  Sex  ! 

I  like  the  jads  for  a'  that. 

CHORUS 

For  a'  that,  an'  a'  that, 

An'  twice  as  muckle  's  a'  that, 

My  dearest  bluid,  to  do  them  guid,18 

to  it 

They  're  welcome  till  't  for  a'  that ! 

RECITATIVO 

walls 

So  sung  the  Bard,  and  Nansie's  wa's 

Shook  with  a  thunder  of  applause, 

Re-echo'd  from  each  mouth  ! 

THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 

23 

They  toom'd  their  pocks,  they  pawn'd  their  duds, 

emptied  their 
bags 

They  scarcely  left  to  coor  their  fuds, 

cover;  tails 

To  quench  their  lowin  drouth. 

burning 

Then  owre  again  the  jovial  thrang 

company 

The  Poet  did  request 

To  lowse  his  pack,  an'  wale  a  sang, 

untie  ;  choose 

A  ballad  o'  the  best : 

He  rising,  rejoicing 

Between  his  twa  Deborahs, 

Looks  round  him,  an'  found  them 

Impatient  for  the  chorus :  — 

AIR 

tune  :  Jolly  Mortals,  Fill  Your  Glasses 

I 

See  the  smoking  bowl  before  us  ! 

Mark  our  jovial,  ragged  ring! 

Round  and  round  take  up  the  chorus, 

And  in  raptures  let  us  sing : 

24 


THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 


CHORUS 

A  fig  for  those  by  law  protected  I 
Liberty  's  a  glorious  feast, 

Courts  for  cowards  were  erected, 
Churches  built  to  please  the  priest ! 

ii 
What  is  title,  what  is  treasure, 

What  is  reputation's  care  ? 
If  we  lead  a  life  of  pleasure, 

'Tis  no  matter  how  or  where  ! 


in 
With  the  ready  trick  and  fable 

Round  we  wander  all  the  day  ; 
And  at  night  in  barn  or  stable 

Hug  our  doxies  on  the  hay. 

IV 

Does  the  train-attended  carriage 
Thro'  the  country  lighter  rove  ? 

Does  the  sober  bed  of  marriage 
Witness  brighter  scenes  of  love  ? 


THE    JOLLY    BEGGARS 


25 


Life  is  all  a  variorum, 

We  regard  not  how  it  goes  ; 

Let  them  cant  about  decorum, 
Who  have  character  to  lose. 

VI 

Here  's  to  budgets,  bags,  and  wallets  ! 

Here  's  to  all  the  wandering  train  ! 
Here  's  our  ragged  brats  and  callets  ! 

One  and  all,  cry  out,  Amen  ! 

CHORUS 

A  fig  for  those  by  law  protected  ! 

Liberty  's  a  glorious  feast, 
Courts  for  cowards  were  erected, 

Churches  built  to  please  the  priest ! 


NOTES 


1  '  The  bauckie  -bird ' :  —  '  The  old  Scotch  name  for 
the  bat.'  (R.  B.  in  us.  [A]).  Perhaps  because  it  hides 
in  the  roofs  of  houses  near  the  '  bauks  '  or  crossbeams. 

2  '  Poosie-Nansie's' :  —  'The  hostess  of  a  noted 
caravanserai  in  Mauchline  well  known  and  much  fre- 
quented by  the  lowest  order  of  travellers  and  pilgrims.' 
(R.  B.  in  ms.  [B]). 

3  'The  vera  girdle  rang':  —  The  girdle  is  a  round 
plate  of  metal  used  in  Scotland  from  time  immemorial 
in  firing  the  oaten  cake. 

4  'Mealy  bags':  —  The  meal-bag  was  the  beggars' 
main  equipment,  as  oatmeal  was  the  staple  alms,  and 
might  be  taken  as  food  or  exchange  or  sold. 

5  'Spon toon':  —  A  weapon  carried  by  soldier- 
officers  instead  of  a  half-pike. 

6  'Tyed  up  like  a  stirk': — i.e.  Punished  with  the 
'jougs,'  a  sort  of  iron  collar. 

7  'Cleek  the  sterlin'  =  ' pinch  the  ready.' 

8  '  For  monie  a  pursie  she  had  hooked ' :  — '  Hook  ' 
is  old  slang  for  (i)  a  finger,  (2)  a  thief.  Burns'  heroine 
was,  in  fact,  a  pick-pocket. 

9  'Braw':  —  Here  used  in  its  original  sense,  and  = 


28 


NOTES 


gaily  dressed :  the  reference  being  to  the  tawdry  finery 
of  the  Highland  vagabond. 

10  'Claymore':  —  A  two-handed  Highland  sword. 

ii  'Driddle':  —  To  driddle  =  to  toddle :  the  refer- 
ence being  to  the  short  steps  of  the  pigmy  scraper, 
not  —  as  has  been  supposed — to  his  bad  uneven  bow- 
ing. 'Trysts'  are  cattle  markets,  and  'fairs'  =  hiring 
fairs  or  'mops.' 

12  '  Budget'  =  tinker's  bag  of  tools. 

13  'And  by  that  dear  Kilbaigie':  —  'A  peculiar 
sort  of  whiskey,  a  great  favourite  with  Poosie  Nansie's 
Clubs.'     (R.  B.  in  MS.  [A]). 

14  *  An'  made  the  bottle  clunk  ' :  — '  Clunk  '  — 
(Yr.faire  glou-glou)  — describes  the  sound  of  empty- 
ing a  narrow-necked  bottle,  especially  by  application 
to  the  mouth. 

1 5  '  A  wight  of  Homer's  craft ' :  — '  Homer  is  allowed 
to  be  the  eldest  ballad  singer  on  record.'  (R.  B.  in 
MS.  [A]). 

16  'Dainty  Davie':  —  This  note  must  be  read  in 
Henley,  Vol.  II,  p.  312,  where  the  adventure,  as  pub- 
lished by  Swift,  (Vol.  xn,  pp.  19,  20,  Scott's  second 
edition,  1883)  is  succulently  set  forth. 

17  '  Helicon,'  =  Kilbaigie  =  whiskey. 

18  'My  dearest  bluid':  —  The  curious  reader  is 
referred  to  the  sonnet  attributed  to  Marlowe.  (See 
Bullen's  edition,  1885,  Vol.  HI,  .p.  247.) 


~)<*<r  fa  JrVW  fad 0/  WJa/?/lA/?0S         n 


^,w**^^*^V 


rHICOBDIHON.dSu) 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


The  Jolly  Beggars  was  undoubtedly  written  as  early 
as  1785.  "Although  the  most  dramatic  of  all  Burns' 
performances,  it  was  not  a  favourite  with  his  mother 
and  brother,  and  he  never  seems  to  have  thought  it 
worthy  of  publication."  (See  Alexander  Smith's  edi- 
tion of  The  Poetical  Works  of  Robert  Burns,  (1865) 
Vol.  1,  p.  319)  In  the  well-known  letter  to  George 
Thomson  (1793)  Burns  said:  "I  have  forgot  the  can- 
tata you  allude  to,  as  I  kept  no  copy,  and  indeed  did 
not  know  of  its  existence ;  however,  I  remember  that 
none  of  the  songs  pleased  myself  except  the  last 
something  about  '  Courts  for  cowards  were  erected, 
Churches  built  to  please  the  priest.' " 

That  three  or  four  mss.  at  one  time  existed,  though 
Burns  in  1793  presumably  had  no  copy  in  his  own 
possession  and  professed  to  hold  it  in  slight  regard,  is 
now  an  accepted  fact.  Henley  had  the  use  of  at  least 
two  mss.  copies  which  he  cites : 


3° 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


(A).  From  this  the  Lithographed  Facsimile  con- 
isting  of  16  folio  pages  was  first  printed  by  Lumsden, 
Glasgow,  (1823  )  and  (B),  entitled  Loz>e  and  Liberty  in 
the  Laing  Collection  in  the  University  of  Edinburgh. 

Henley's  text,  which  we  have  followed  is  based  on 
both  mss.,  his  preference  being  in  favour  of  (A),  "  one  of 
the  finest  extant  specimens  of  the  poet's  earlier  hand," 
though  (B)  has  a  few  readings  superior  to  (A). 


II 


We  now  come  to  the  first  appearance  of  the 
printed  text  (See  Facsimile  1)  which  is  definitely  set 
forth  in  the  Memorial  Catalogue  of  the  Burns  Exhibi- 
tion i8<p6.  (Glasgow  1898)  in  the  following  entry: 

LENT  BY  THE  MITCHELL  LIBRARY 


No.  1297.  The  Jolly  Beggars  :  A  Cantata,  By  Robert 
Burns.  [Quotation.]  Glasgow  :  Printed  for  and  sold  by 
Stewart  and  Meikle.    (18  mo.  Pp  16) 

First  edition,  published  13th  July  1799,  price  two-pence. 
The  tract  wants  recitative  beginning  — 

"  Poor  Merry-Andrew  in  the  neuk 
Sat  guzzling  with  a  tinkler-hizzie," 

and  song  which   follows  —  "Sir  Wisdom's  a  fool   when 
he  's  fou." 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


31 


From  The  Printed  Works  of  Robert  Burns,  a  Bibli- 
ography in  Outline  by  W.  Craibe  Angus.  Glasgow; 
Privately  printed.  1899.  (60  copies  only.),  the  fol- 
lowing entries  are  taken  : 

The  Jolly  Beggars :  a  Cantata,  By  Robert  Burns. 
Glasgow  :  Printed  for  and  sold  by  Stewart  &  Meikle. 
[Fcap.    8vo.     Pp.  16.]     [1799.] 

The  first  edition,  issued  on  13th  July,  1799,  price  two- 
pence. Printed  from  the  manuscript  given  by  Burns  to 
John  Richmond. 

Uncut.  Bound  in  red  morocco  and  decorated  in  an 
original  design,  intertwined  with  a  verse  from  the  text  on 
each  of  the  boards,  by  Cobden-Sanderson.  The  only  uncut 
copy  known  to  collectors. 

The  Jolly  Beggars ;  or  Tatterdemallions.  A  Cantata. 
By  Robert  Burns,  the  Ayrshire  Poet.  To  which  are  added 
Lines  on  Wrangling,  The  Wish,  and  The  Lady's  Choice. 
Glasgow  :  Printed  by  Chapman  and  Lang  for  Stewart  and 
Meikle.  [Fcap  8vo.]  [1800.]  With  the  autograph  of 
Robert  Louis  Stevenson.  Uncut.  Mounted  in  morocco 
case  by  Zaehnsdorf. 

The  Jolly  Beggars:  a  Cantata,  Ascribed  to  the  cele- 
brated Robert  Burns.  Newcastle-upon-Tyne.  [121110.] 
1804. 

The  Jolly  Beggars ;  or,  Tatterdemalions':  a  Cantata.  By 
Robert  Burns.     Edinburgh.    [i8mo.]     1808. 

Facsimile  of  Burns'  celebrated  Poem,  entitled  "The 
Jolly  Beggars."     From  the  original  manuscript,  in  the 


32 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


possession  of  Thomas  Stewart,  Esq.,  Greenock.  James 
Lumsden  &  Son, Glasgow.  Uto.]  1823.  With  the  White- 
foord  Mackenzie  ex-libris.    [See  Facsimile  11.] 

Another  copy,  in  coloured  wrapper. 

Facsimile  of  Burns'  celebrated  Poem,  entitled  "The 
Jolly  Beggars."  Re-issue.  1838.  [The  copy  in  the  Boston 
Public  Library  has  a  lithographed  frontispiece  from  the 
original  engraving  by  William  Allan.  The  Preface  or 
'Advertisement'  signed  W.  W.  and  dated  Dec,  1837,  is 
new  and  replaces  that  of  the  1823  edition.] 

Re-issue,  undated. 

The  Jolly  Beggars :  a  Cantata.  By  Robert  Burns. 
Edinburgh  :  Printed  by  William  Reid.     [8vo.]     1829. 

Points  of  Humour  :  Illustrated  by  the  Designs  of  George 
Cruikshank.    London:  C.Baldwin.    [8vo.]     1823. 

Points  v-vm :  "The  Jolly  Beggars;  or,  Love  and 
Liberty." 


When  the  library  of  Mr.  W.  Craibe  Angus  of  Glas- 
gow was  sold  at  Alexander  Dowell's,  Edinburgh,  Dec. 
8-10,  1902,  it  contained  these  two  lots: 

Burns,  R.  The  Jolly  Beggars,  a  Cantata  —  The  Kirk's 
Alarm,  etc.  (enclosed  in  cloth  case),  1799.    (489).     £26. 

[The  Jolly  Beggars  of  which  only  two  copies  are  said 
to  be  known,  is  a  pamphlet  of  16  pages.  12  mo.  pub- 
lished at  2d.  The  two  pieces  sold  on  this  occasion,  each 
of  them  belonging  to  the  firstedition,  cost  Mr.  Angus  ^21. ] 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


33 


Bums,  R.  The  Jolly  Beggars,  or  Tatterdemallions,  a 
Cantata,  etc.  16  pages  uncut,  unopened,  in  pouch  case  of 
Spanish  morocco,  made  by  Zaehnsdorf  (with  autograph, 
"Robert  Louis  Stevenson  "  on  title),  Glasgow,  Stewart  & 
Meikle,  1799.     13  mo.  (465)  .£11. 

It  will  thus  be  seen  that  the  first  printed  edition  of 
the  text  was  imperfect,  and  remained  so  in  the  Poems 
Ascribed  to  Robert  Burns  printed  for  Thomas  Stewart, 
Glasgow,  1 80 1,  a  copy  of  which  in  the  original  blue 
paper  boards  with  label  on  side  intact,  is  now  before 
me.     This  label  design  I  reproduce  on  my  own  cover. 

Scott's  censure  of  Cromek's  omission  of  The  Jolly 
Beggars  in  his  Reliqites,  (1808,)  was  not  cheerfully  re- 
ceived by  that  enterprising  publisher,  but  he  did  make 
use  of  the  complete  text  in  his  collection  of  Scottish 
Songs,  (1 810).  See  Vol.  II,  pp.  229-264.  For  a  gratui- 
tous insult  flung  at  Scott,  ibid,  p.  255. 

The  present  is  the  First  American  edition  of  The 
Jolly  Beggars  issued  by  and  for  itself  alone. 


COMMENTS 


SIR  WALTER  SCOTT  (1809) 

(From  a  review  of  Cromek's  Reliques  of  Robert  Burns, 
iSo8,  in  The  Quarterly  Review,  Edinburgh,  Feb- 
ruary ,1809.) 

YET  applauding,  as  we  do  most  highly 
applaud,  the  leading  principles  of  Dr. 
Currie's  selection,  we  are  aware  that 
they  sometimes  led  him  into  fastidious 
and  over-delicate  rejection  of  the  bard's  most  spirited 
and  happy  effusions.  A  thin  octavo,  published  at 
Glasgow  in  1901,  under  the  title  of  "Poems  ascribed 
to  Robert  Burns,  the  Ayrshire  bard,"  furnishes  valu- 
able proofs  of  this  assertion.  It  contains,  among  a 
good  deal  of  rubbish,  some  of  his  most  brilliant 
poetry.  A  cantata  in  particular,  called  The  Jolly  Beg- 
gars, for  humorous  description  and  nice  discrimination 
of  character,  is  inferior  to  no  poem  of  the  same  length 


36 


COMMENTS 


in  the  whole  range  of  English  poetry.  The  scene, 
indeed,  is  laid  in  the  very  lowest  department  of  low 
life,  the  actors  being  a  set  of  strolling  vagrants,  met 
to  carouse  and  barter  their  rags  and  plunder  for  liquor 
in  a  hedge  ale-house.  Yet,  even  in  describing  the 
movements  of  such  a  group,  the  native  taste  of 
the  poet  has  never  suffered  his  pen  to  slide  into  any 
thing  coarse  or  disgusting.  The  extravagant  glee  and 
outrageous  frolic  of  the  beggars  are  ridiculously  con- 
trasted with  their  maimed  limbs,  rags,  and  crutches ; 
the  sordid  and  squalid  circumstances  of  their  appear- 
ance are  judiciously  thrown  into  the  shade.  Nor  is 
the  art  of  the  poet  less  conspicuous  in  the  individual 
figures,  than  in  the  general  mass.  The  festive  vagrants 
are  distinguished  from  each  other  by  personal  appear- 
ance and  character,  as  much  as  any  fortuitous  assembly 
in  the  higher  orders  of  life.  The  group,  it  must  be 
observed,  is  of  Scottish  character,  and  doubtless  our 
northern  brethren  are  more  familiar  with  its  varieties 
than  we  are :  yet  the  distinctions  are  too  well  marked 
to  escape  even  the  Southron.  The  most  prominent 
persons  are  a  maimed  soldier  and  his  female  com- 
panion, a  hackneyed  follower  of  the  camp,  a  stroller, 
late  the  consort  of  an  Highland  ketterer  or  sturdy 
beggar,  —  "but  weary  fa'  the  waefu'  woodie  !  "  Being 
now    at    liberty,    she    becomes  an   object  of    rivalry 


COMMENTS 


37 


between  a  "  pigmy  scraper  with  his  fiddle "  and  a 
strolling  tinker.  The  latter,  a  desperate  bandit,  like 
most  of  his  profession,  terrifies  the  musician  out  of 
the  field,  and  is  preferred  by  the  damsel,  of  course. 
A  wandering  ballad -singer,  with  a  brace  of  doxies,  is 
last  introduced  upon  the  stage.  Each  of  these  mendi- 
cants sings  a  song  in  character,  and  such  a  collection 
of  humorous  lyrics,  connected  by  vivid  poetical 
description,  is  not,  perhaps,  to  be  paralleled  in  the 
English  language.  .  .  .  The  concluding  ditty,  chaunted 
by  the  ballad-singer  at  the  request  of  the  company, 
whose  "  mirth  and  fun  have  now  grown  fast  and 
furious,"  and  set  them  above  all  sublunary  terrors  of 
jails,  stocks,  and  whipping-posts,  is  certainly  far 
superior  to  any  thing  in  the  Beggars'  Opera,  where 
alone  we  could  expect  to  find  its  parallel. 

We  are  at  a  loss  to  conceive  any  good  reason  why 
Dr.  Currie  did  not  introduce  this  singular  and  humor- 
ous cantata  into  his  collection.  It  is  true,  that,  in  one 
or  two  passages,  the  muse  has  trespassed  slightly  upon 
decorum,  where,  in  the  language  of  the  Scottish  song, 

"  High  kilted  was  she 

As  she  gaed  owre  the  lea." 


Something,  however,  is  to  be  allowed  to  the  nature  of 
the  subject,  and  something  to  the  education  of  the 


38 


COMMENTS 


poet:  and  if,  from  veneration  to  the  names  of  Swift 
and  Dryden,  we  tolerate  the  grossness  of  the  one,  and 
the  indelicacy  of  the  other,  the  respect  due  to  that  of 
Burns,  may  surely  claim  indulgence  for  a  few  light 
strokes  of  broad  humour. 


II 


LOCKHART  (1828) 

(From    The  Life  of  Robert  Burns  by  J.  G.  Lockhart, 
Edinburgh,  1829.) 

The  cantata  of  The  Jolly  Beggars,  which  was  not 
printed  at  all  until  some  time  after  the  poet's  death, 
and  has  not  been  included  in  the  editions  of  his  works 
until  within  these  few  years,  cannot  be  considered  as  it 
deserves,  without  strongly  heightening  our  regret  that 
Burns  never  lived  to  execute  his  meditated  drama. 
That  extraordinary  sketch,  coupled  with  his  later  lyrics 
in  a  higher  vein,  is  enough  to  show  that  in  him  we  had 
a  master  capable  of  placing  the  musical  drama  on  a 
level  with  the  loftiest  of  our  classical  forms.  Beggars 
Bush,  and  Beggars'  Opera,  sink  into  tameness  in  the 
comparison  ;  and  indeed,  without  profanity  to  the  name 
of  Shakspeare,  it  may  be  said,  that  out  of  such  mate- 
rials, even  his  genius  could  hardly  have  constructed  a 


COMMENTS 


39 


piece  in  which  imagination  could  have  more  splendidly 
predominated  over  the  outward  show  of  things — in 
which  the  sympathy-awakening  power  of  poetry  could 
have  been  displayed  more  triumphantly  under  circum- 
stances of  the  greatest  difficulty.  That  remarkable 
performance,  by  the  way,  was  an  early  production  of 
the  Mauchline  period;  I  know  nothing  but  the  Tarn  o' 
Shanter  that  is  calculated  to  convey  so  high  an  impres- 
sion of  what  Burns  might  have  done. 


Ill 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  (1828) 

(From  the  review  of  Lockhart's  Life  of  Burns  in  The 
Edinburgh  Review  for  December,  1828.) 

Perhaps  we  may  venture  to  say,  that  the  most 
strictly  poetical  of  all  his  'poems'  is  one  which  does 
not  appear  in  Currie's  Edition;  but  has  been  often 
printed  before  and  since,  under  the  humble  title  of 
The  folly  Beggars.  The  subject  truly  is  among  the 
lowest  in  Nature;  but  it  only  the  more  shews  our 
Poet's  gift  in  raising  it  into  the  domain  of  Art.  To 
our  minds,  this  piece  seems  thoroughly  compacted ; 
melted  together,  refined;  and  poured  forth  in  one 
flood  of  true  liquid  harmony.     It  is  light,  airy,  soft  of 


4° 


COMMENTS 


movement ;  yet  sharp  and  precise  in  its  details  ;  every 
face  is  a  portrait :  that  rancle  carlin,  that  wee  Apollo, 
that  Son  of  Mars,  are  Scottish,  yet  ideal;  the  scene  is 
at  once  a  dream,  and  the  very  Ragcastle  of  'Poosie- 
Nansie.'  Farther,  it  seems  in  a  considerable  degree 
complete,  a  real  self-supporting  Whole,  which  is  the 
highest  merit  in  a  poem.  The  blanket  of  the  Night  is 
drawn  asunder  for  a  moment ;  in  full,  ruddy,  flaming 
light,  these  rough  tatterdemalions  are  seen  in  their 
boisterous  revel ;  for  the  strong  pulse  of  Life  vindi- 
cates its  right  to  gladness  even  here;  and  when  the 
curtain  closes,  we  prolong  the  action,  without  effort ; 
the  next  day  as  the  last,  our  Caird  and  our  Ballad- 
monger,  are  singing  and  soldering ;  their  '  brats  and 
callets '  are  hawking,  begging,  cheating;  and  some 
other  night,  in  new  combinations,  they  will  wring  from 
Fate  another  hour  of  wassail  and  good  cheer.  Apart 
from  the  universal  sympathy  with  man  which  this 
again  bespeaks  in  Burns,  a  genuine  inspiration  and  no 
inconsiderable  technical  talent  are  manifested  here. 
There  is  the  fidelity,  humour,  warm  life  and  accurate 
painting  and  grouping  of  some  Teniers,  for  whom 
hostlers  and  carousing  peasants  are  not  without  signifi- 
cance. It  would  be  strange,  doubtless,  to  call  this  the 
best  of  Burns's  writings :  we  mean  to  say  only,  that  it 
seems  to  us  the  most  perfect  of  its  kind,  as  a  piece  of 


COMMENTS 


poetical  composition,  strictly  so  called.  In  the  Beg- 
gars' Opera,  in  the  Beggar's  Bush,  as  other  critics 
have  already  remarked,  there  is  nothing  which,  in  real 
poetic  vigour,  equals  this  Cantata;  nothing,  as  we 
think,  which  comes  within  many  degrees  of  it. 


41 


IV 

WILLIAM  SCOTT  DOUGLAS  (1879) 

(From  The  Works  of  Robert  Burns,  edited  by  William 
Scott  Douglas,  6  vols,  octavo,  London,  1891. 
See  Vol.  iv,  pp.  98-100.) 

Nothing  that  Burns  ever  produced  displays  his 
genius  more  completely  than  his  celebrated  cantata 
of  The  Jolly  Beggars,  which  must  have  been  com- 
posed at  this  very  period.  It  is  known  to  have  sprung 
out  of  a  night  adventure  in  the  summer  or  autumn  of 
1785,  when  the  poet,  in  fellowship  with  his  bosom- 
cronies,  John  Richmond  and  James  Smith,  was  bent 
on  a  little  more  fun,  after  issuing  from  their  howff&t 
the  VVhitefoord  Arms.  Nearly  opposite  the  entrance- 
gate  of  Mauchline  kirkyard,  a  narrow  street,  called 
the  Cowgate,  runs  off  from  the  main  street  or  highway 
which  is  here  broad  and  spacious.  The  spectator, 
standing  with  his  back  to  the  scene  of  "The  Holy 
fair,"  confronts  a  house  of  two  storeys  which  was  once 


42 


COMMENTS 


the  white-washed  Inn  of  "  John  Dow,  vintner,"  with 
the  arms  of  Sir  John  Whitefoord  of  Ballochmyle 
blazoned  on  a  signboard  above  the  door.  It  is  on  the 
right  hand  side,  near  the  corner  of  the  Cowgate  just 
referred  to;  and  on  the  left  hand  side,  at  the  opposite 
corner,  stands  an  old  building  of  humbler  aspect 
which,  in  the  poet's  Mossgiel  days,  was  tenanted  by  a 
Mrs.  Gibson,  who  used  it  as  a  licensed  ale  shop  and 
lodging  house  for  all  and  sundry  pedlars,  cadgers  and 
other  vagrants.  The  hostess  bore  the  soubriquet  of 
"  Poosie  Nancy"  and  she  had  a  half-witted  daughter 
who  was  styled  "Racer  Jess"  from  her  powerful 
pedestrian  qualities  and  passion  for  attending  country 
fairs  and  race-matches. 

Burns  and  his  two  companions  in  passing  Nancy's 
door  on  the  occasion  referred  to,  were  attracted  by 
more  than  common  manifestations  of  uproarious 
hilarity  within,  and  they  knocked  and  asked  leave  to 
mix  in  the  scene  of  enjoyment,  and  were  made  welcome 
to  enter.  The  "jovial  ragged  ring"  there  assembled, 
and  shouting  in  chorus  round  a  smoking  bowl,  little 
knew  what  sort  of  chield  had  come  among  them 
"  taking  notes  ;  "  but  the  poet  and  his  friends,  after  a 
contribution  to  the  general  fund,  and  enjoying  for  half 
an  hour  the  rough  entertainment,  came  away  somewhat 
impressed,  if  not  edified,  with  what  they  had  witnessed. 


COMMENTS 


43 


A  few  days  thereafter  Burns  produced  to  Richmond  a 
draft  of  the  wonderful  cantata,  in  which  a  sailor  was 
introduced  as  one  of  the  persons  of  the  drama, 
although  ultimately  left  out  in  the  finished  manuscript. 
Richmond  who,  as  we  have  seen,  was  a  clerk  in  the 
office  of  Mr.  Gavin  Hamilton,  and  also  "Clerk  of 
Courts"  in  the  burlesque  "Court  of  Equity"  which 
held  its  meetings  in  John  Dow's  Inn,  removed  from 
Mauchline  to  a  situation  in  Edinburgh  about  Martin- 
mas, 1785.  It  is  certain  that  he  carried  with  him  a 
holograph  copy  of  The  Jolly  Beggars,  in  whole  or  in 
part,  and  through  him  the  existence  of  such  a  poem 
was  made  known  in  Edinburgh.  George  Thomson, 
who  had  seen  it  or  heard  of  it,  made  enquiries  regard- 
ing it  in  one  of  his  letters  to  Burns  in  1793.  ^n  tne 
poet's  reply,  dated  13th  September  of  that  year  he 
says:  —  "I  have  forgot  the  cantata  you  allude  to,  as  I 
kept  no  copy,  and  indeed  did  not  know  of  its  existence ; 
however  I  renumber  that  none  of  the  songs  pleased 
myself,  except  the  last,  something  about 

Courts  for  cowards  were  erected, 
Churches  built  to  please  the  priest." 


George  Thomson,  in  1818  published  the  cantata  set 
to  music  and  arranged  with  choruses  by  Sir  Henry  R. 
Bishop.     Some  portions  of  that  music,  and  especially 


44 


COMMENTS 


the  soldier's  song,  "  I  am  a  son  of  Mars,"  have  become 
popular.  The  grand  closing  chorus,  however,  "  See 
the  smoking  bowl  before  us,"  being  the  song  which 
Burns  remembered  with  most  satisfaction,  is  not  so 
happy,  and  makes  one  regret  that  the  composer  had 
not  accepted  the  old  air, "  Jolly  mortals  fill  your 
glasses,"  to  which  the  poet  wrote  the  words. 

The  latter,  as  impressed  on  our  memory  by  hearing 
it  sung  by  our  schoolfellows  half  a  century  ago,  we 
shall  here  endeavour  to  convey  to  the  musical  reader, 
[see  Facsimile  in]  in  the  hope  that  he  may  agree  with 
us  in  thinking  that  "  the  auld  spring  dings  the  new." 


WILLIAM  ERNEST  HENLEY  (1896) 

(From  The  Centenary  Burns,  edited  by  W.  E.  Henley 
and  T.  F.  Henderson,  4  vols,  octavo,  Edinburgh, 
1896.  The  passages  that  follow  are  taken  from 
Henley's  notes,  see  Vol.  II,  pp.  291-306.) 

The  Burns  of  this  'puissant  and  splendid  produc- 
tion,' as  Matthew  Arnold  calls  it  —  this  irresistible 
presentation  of  humanity  caught  in  the  act  and  sum- 
marised for  ever  in  the  terms  of  art  —  comes  into  line 
with  divers  poets  of  repute,  from  our  own  Dekker  and 
John  Fletcher  to  the  singer  of  les  Gueux  (18 13)  and 
le  Vieux  Vagabond  (1830),  and  approves  himself  their 


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COMMENTS 


45 


master  in  the  matter  of  such  qualities  as  humour, 
vision,  lyrical  potency,  descriptive  style,  and  the  faculty 
of  swift,  dramatic  presentation,  to  a  purpose  that  may 
not  be  gainsaid.  It  was  suggested  by  a  chance  visit 
(in  company  with  Richmond  and  Smith)  to  the  'doss- 
house  '  of  Poosie  Nansie,  as  Agnes  Gibson  was  nick- 
named ...  in  the  Cowgate,  Mauchline.  This  'ken' 
stood  directly  opposite  Johnie  Dow's  tavern  (The 
Whitefoord  Arms).  Thence  issuing,  the  three  friends 
heard  a  sound  of  revelry  at  Poosie  Nansie's,  whose 
company  they  joined.  And  a  few  days  afterwards 
Burns  recited  several  bits  of  the  cantata  to  Richmond. 

The  personages  of  Burns's  Cantata — ruffler  and 
strolling  mort,  trull  and  tinker,  ballad-singer  and  bawdy- 
basket —  are  more  or  less  the  personages  of  the 
treatises  and  songbooks.  But  they  have  been  renewed 
by  observation  from  the  life,  and  they  are  made 
immortal  by  the  fire  of  that  inspiration  through  which 
they  were  passed.  Burns,  if  we  may  believe  his  own 
words,  could  sympathise  with  such  outcasts,  and  had 
at  least  a  sentimental  fancy  for  the  life  they  led. 


And  as  early  as  1784  he  is  moved  to  confide  to  his 
First  Common  Place  Book  that  he  has  'often  observed, 
in  the  course  of  "his"  experience  of  human  life'  — 


46 


COMMENTS 


which  already  included  Irvine  and  the  Carrick  smug- 
glers—  'that  every  man,  even  the  worst,  has  some- 
thing good  about  him ' ;  for  which  reason,  '  I  have 
often  courted  the  acquaintance  of  that  part  of  man- 
kind commonly  known  by  the  ordinary  phrase  of 
"blackguards,"  sometimes  further  than  was  consistent 
with  the  safety  of  my  character.'  It  is  sheer  imperti- 
nence to  assume,  with  certain  commentators,  that  he 
figured  himself  in  the  person  of  his  own  Ballad  Singer. 
But  it  is  undeniable  that  he  set  forth  some  of  his  own 
philosophy  of  life  at  that  disreputable  artist's  lips ; 
also  with  him  it  was  ever  'The  heart  ay  's  the  part  ay 
That  maks  us  right  or  wrang' ;  and  it  is  pretty  safe  to 
argue  that  his  regard  for  the  '  f raternitie  of  vacabondes ' 
was  so  far  both  temperamental  and  sincere.  And 
this,  in  brief,  is  why  Matthew  Arnold  prefers  the 
Burns  of  The  Jolly  Beggars  before  the  Goethe  of  the 
'  Scene  in  Auerbach's  Cellar.'  With  a  superb  intel- 
ligence, the  Scot  creates  his  people  from  within ; 
while  the  German's  apprehension  of  his  company  is 
merely  intellectual  and  pedantic. 


Here  as  elsewhere,  in  short,  Burns  was  working  on 
traditional  lines;  and  that  The  Jolly  Beggars  remains 
immortal,  while  his  models  have  long  since  disappeared, 
is  due   to   the  fact  —  not  that   it  is  in  any  sense  an 


COMMENTS 


47 


invention  in  form  but  —  that,  treating  of  things 
familiar  in  familiar  terms,  it  is  also  a  piece  of  rare  and 
admirable  genius. 


The  Jolly  Beggars  may  be  the  piece  referred  to  in 
the  letter  to  Richmond,  17th  February,  1786:  —  'I 
have  enclosed  you  a  piece  of  rhyming  ware  for  your 
perusal.'  Richmond  told  Chambers  that  in  the  Cantata, 
as  originally  composed,  to  the  best  of  his  memory 
there  were  included  songs  for  a  sweep  and  a  sailor 
(the  whipjack,  or  dry -land  sailor,  is  one  of  the  oldest 
members  of  the  Cursitors'  Society) ;  and  there  is 
other  evidence  that  Burns  greatly  modified  his  first 
draft.  In  reply  to  a  query  of  George  Thomson  he 
wrote  in  1793:  —  'I  have  forgot  the  Cantata  you 
allude  to,  as  I  kept  no  copy,  and  indeed  did  not  know 
that  it  was  in  existence;  however,  I  remember  that 
none  of  the  songs  pleased  myself  except  the  last  — 
something  about :  — 

"  Courts  for  cowards  were  erected, 

Churches  built  to  please  the  priest.'" 

This  was,  no  doubt,  honest  criticism,  for  the  songs 
were  mostly  Scoto-English.  But  the  artistic  finish  of 
the  thing  suggests  the  intention  to  publish ;  and  it 
may  very  well  have  been  submitted  to  the  'jury  of 
literati'    in    Edinburgh    (1787),    and    have    failed    to 


48 


COMMENTS 


approve  itself  to  that  body's   '  pedant  frigid  soul  of 
criticism.' 


The  Jolly  Beggars  was  not  published  by  Currie, 
and  —  some  have  supposed  —  was  not  even  submitted 
to  him.  But  that  he  deliberately  rejected  it  is  clear 
from  a  MS.  letter  of  Alexander  Cunningham  to  Syme, 
17th  September,  1796  (with  other  important  MSS.  in 
the  possession  of  Cunningham's  grandson,  who  has 
kindly  given  us  copies):  —  'There  has  been  put  into 
my  hand  a  poem  entitled  Love  atid  Liberty.  I  pre- 
sume you  have  seen  it.  Were  the  pruning-knife 
applied  to  some  of  the  broad  humour  it  might  be 
published  without  incurring  much  censure  —  at  least 
it  would  be  admired  by  many  and  is  surely  too  valu- 
able to  be  thrown  aside.'  Cromek  expressed  to 
Creech  strong  scruples  with  regard  to  publishing  The 

Jolly  Beggars,  as  also  Holy  Willie's  Prayer 

Creech  seems  to  have  advised  him  against  it,  on  the 
score  of  prudence,  for  he  did  not  include  it  in  the 
Peliques,  1808;  but,  being  severely  censured  by  Sir 
Walter  Scott  for  ignoring  it,  he  published  it  in  Scottish 
Songs,  1810,  at  the  same  time  that  he  declined  to  take 
in  Holy  Willie's  Prayer  by  reason  of  'its  open  and 
daring  profanity,  and  the  frequent  and  familiar  in- 
troduction of  the  sacred  name  of  the  Deity.' 


COMMENTS 


49 


VI 

ANDREW  LANG  (1886-1896) 

(From  Lang's  Poems  and  Songs  of  Burns,  1896,  and 
Letters  to  Dead  Authors,  1886.) 

This  immortal  poem  was  partly  given  in  manuscript 
by  Burns,  "  as  rich  men  give  who  care  not  for  their 
gifts,"  to  one  Richmond,  in  whose  company,  in  1785, 
he  had  watched  a  festival  of  vagrom  men.  In  1793, 
Burns  had  forgotten  the  Cantata,  and  kept  no  copy. 
Shakespeare  was  not  more  regardless  of  his  works. 
The  rest  of  the  manuscript  was  presented  by  Burns  to 
a  Mr.  David  Woodburn,  without  Richmond's  part, 
which  has  been  added  —  it  runs  from  "Poor  Merry- 
Andrew  "  to  "  he 's  far  dafter  than  I."  The  whole  ms. 
has  wandered  to  the  Azores,  to  Nova  Scotia,  and 
home  again.  (Scott  Douglas.)  Part  of  Tennyson's 
Vision  of  Sin  is  clearly  inspired  by  this  Cantata.  It  is 
characteristic  of  Burns  that  he  neither  published  nor 
took  any  pains  to  secure  the  future  of  this  extraordi- 
nary piece,  first  printed  in  1 799,  by  Stewart  and  Meikle, 
without  Richmond's  portion,  added  in  1801  by  Thomas 
Stewart. 


The  touch  of  a  lettered  society,  the  strife  with  the 
Kirk,  discontent  with  the  State,  poverty  and  pride* 
neglect  and  success,  were  needed  to  make  your  Genius 


5° 


COMMENTS 


what  it  was,  and  to  endow  the  world  with  Tarn  d1 
Shunter,  The  Jolly  Beggars,  and  Holy  Willie's  Prayer. 
Who  can  praise  them  too  highly  —  who  admire  in 
them  too  much  the  humour,  the  scorn,  the  wisdom, 
the  unsurpassed  energy  and  courage  ? 
So  powerful,  so  commanding,  is  the  movement  of  that 
Beggars'  Chorus,  that,  methinks,  it  unconsciously 
echoed  in  the  brain  of  our  greatest  living  poet  when 
he  conceived  the  Vision  of  Sin.  You  shall  judge  for 
yourself.     Recall  — 

Here  's  to  budgets,  bags,  and  wallets  ! 
Then  read  this  : 

Drink  to  lofty  hopes  that  cool  — 

Visions  of  a  perfect  state  : 
Drink  we,  last,  the  public  fool, 

Frantic  love  and  frantic  hate. 

Drink  to  Fortune,  drink  to  Chance, 

While  we  keep  a  little  breath  ! 
Drink  to  heavy  Ignorance, 

Hob  and  nob  with  brother  Death  ! 

Is  not  the  movement  the  same,  though  the  modern 
speaks  a  wilder  recklessness  ? 

So  in  the  best  company  we  leave  you,  who  were  the 
life  and  soul  of  so  so  much  company,  good  and  bad. 
No  poet,  since  the  Psalmist  of  Israel,  ever  gave  the 
world  more  assurance  of  a  man. 


SOME  ASPECTS  OF 
ROBERT  BURNS 


Some  Aspects  of  Robert  Burns  which  first  appeared  in 
the  Cornhill  Magazine  [1879],  and  was  reissued  in 
Familiar  Studies  of  Men  and  Books,  [1882]  should  be  read 
in  connexion  and  with  certain  qualifications  as  set 
out  in  Henley's  Terminal  Essay  [i8g6].  For  all  that 
"  R.  L.  S."  practically  remains  master  of  the  situa- 
tion, and  with  the  prefatory  addition  to  his  essay  we 
may  leave  him  to  the  "  owre  true  tale."  With  the 
highest  opinion  of  Henley  and  believing  that  the 
Centenary  Burns  is,  humanly  speaking,  a  final  critical 
estimate  that  will  remain  when  all  previous  editions 
and  commentaries  have  gone  the  ways  of  dusty  death, 
he  still  lacked  that  milk  of  human  kindness  which  in 
Stevenson  sweetens  his  depreciation  and  leavens  his 
"  shorter  catechist "  attitude  in  its  lack  of  sympathetic 
interpretation.  In  other  words  one  can  reconcile 
Stevenson  with  Burns,  whereas  there  is  in  Henley's 
"inspired  peasant"  insistence  in  season  and  out,  a 
something  with  a  bitter  taste  behind.  We  may  safely 
rely  on  Henley  as  an  editor ;  as  a  lover  of  Bums  give 
me  Stevenson,  who  considered  these  Aspects  with  a 
justifiable  degree  of  self-satisfaction. 

T.    B.    M. 


SOME   ASPECTS   OF  ROBERT 
BURNS 


=;*\A  O  write  with  authority  about  another 
man,  we  must  have  fellow-feeling  and 
some  common  ground  of  experience  with 
our  subject.  We  may  praise  or  blame 
according  as  we  find  him  related  to  us  by  the  best  or 
worst  in  ourselves ;  but  it  is  only  in  virtue  of  some 
relationship  that  we  can  be  his  judges,  even  to  con- 
demn. Feelings  which  we  share  and  understand  enter 
for  us  into  the  tissue  of  the  man's  character;  those  to 
which  we  are  strangers  in  our  own  experience  we  are 
inclined  to  regard  as  blots,  exceptions,  inconsistencies, 
and  excursions  of  the  diabolic  ;  we  conceive  them  with 
repugnance,  explain  them  with  difficulty,  and  raise  our 
hands  to  heaven  in  wonder  when  we  find  them  in  con- 
junction with  talents  that  we  respect  or  virtues  that 
we  admire.  David,  king  of  Israel,  would  pass  a 
sounder  judgment  on  a  man  than  either  Nathaniel  or 


54 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


David  Hume.  Now,  Principal  Shairp's  recent  volume, 
although  I  believe  no  one  will  read  it  without  respect 
and  interest,  has  this  one  capital  defect  —  that  there  is 
imperfect  sympathy  between  the  author  and  the  sub- 
ject, between  the  critic  and  the  personality  under 
criticism.  Hence  an  inorganic,  if  not  an  incoherent, 
presentation  of  both  the  poems  and  the  man.  Of 
Holy  Willie's  Prayer,  Principal  Shairp  remarks  that 
"  those  who  have  loved  most  what  was  best  in  Burns's 
poetry  must  have  regretted  that  it  was  ever  written." 
To  the  Jolly  Beggars,  so  far  as  my  memory  serve's  me, 
he  refers  but  once ;  and  then  only  to  remark  on  the 
"strange,  not  to  say  painful,"  circumstance  that  the 
same  hand  which  wrote  the  Colter's  Saturday  ATight 
should  have  stooped  to  write  the  Jolly  Beggars.  The 
Saturday  Night  may  or  may  not  be  an  admirable 
poem ;  but  its  significance  is  trebled,  and  the  power 
and  range  of  the  poet  first  appears,  when  it  is  set 
beside  the  Jolly  Beggars.  To  take  a  man's  work  piece- 
meal, except  with  the  design  of  elegant  extracts,  is  the 
way  to  avoid,  and  not  to  perform,  the  critic's  duty. 
The  same  defect  is  displayed  in  the  treatment  of 
Burns  as  a  man,  which  is  broken,  apologetical,  and 
confused.  The  man  here  presented  to  us  is  not  that 
Burns,  teres  atque  rolundus  —  a  burly  figure  in  litera- 
ture, as,  from  our  present  vantage  of  time,  we  have 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


55 


begun  to  see  him.  This,  on  the  other  hand,  is  Burns 
as  he  may  have  appeared  to  a  contemporary  clergyman, 
whom  we  shall  conceive  to  have  been  a  kind  and  indul- 
gent but  orderly  and  orthodox  person,  anxious  to  be 
pleased,  but  too  often  hurt  and  disappointed  by  the 
behaviour  of  his  red-hot  protege,  and  solacing  himself 
with  the  explanation  that  the  poet  was  "  the  most 
inconsistent  of  men."  If  you  are  so  sensibly  pained 
by  the  misconduct  of  your  subject,  and  so  paternally 
delighted  with  his  virtues,  you  will  always  be  an 
excellent  gentleman,  but  a  somewhat  questionable 
biographer.  Indeed,  we  can  only  be  sorry  and  sur- 
prised that  Principal  Shairp  should  have  chosen  a 
theme  so  uncongenial.  When  we  find  a  man  writing 
on  Burns,  who  likes  neither  Holy  Willie,  nor  the  Beg- 
gars, nor  the  Ordination,  nothing  is  adequate  to  the 
situation  but  the  old  cry  of  Geronte:  "Que  diable 
allait-il  faire  dans  cette  galere  ?  "  And  every  merit  we 
find  in  the  book,  which  is  sober  and  candid  in  a  degree 
unusual  with  biographies  of  Burns,  only  leads  us  to 
regret  more  heartily  that  good  work  should  be  so 
greatly  thrown  away. 1 

It  is  far  from  my  intention  to  tell  over  again  a  story 
that  has  been  so  often  told;  but  there  are  certainly 
some  points  in  the  character  of  Burns  that  will  bear  to 

i  See  note  at  close  of  this  essay. 


56 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


be  brought  out,  and  some  chapters  in  Sis  life  that 
demand  a  brief  rehearsal.  The  unity  of  the  man's 
nature,  for  all  its  richness,  has  fallen  somewhat  out  of 
sight  in  the  pressure  of  new  information  and  the  apol- 
ogetical  ceremony  of  biographers.  Mr.  Carlyle  made 
an  inimitable  bust  of  the  poet's  head  of  gold;  may  I 
not  be  forgiven  if  my  business  should  have  more  to  do 
with  the  feet,  which  were  of  clay. 


Any  view  of  Burns  would  be  misleading  which 
passed  over  in  silence  the  influences  of  his  home  and 
his  father.  That  father,  William  Burnes,  after  having 
been  for  many  years  a  gardener,  took  a  farm,  married, 
and,  like  an  emigrant  in  a  new  country,  built  himself  a 
house  with  his  own  hands.  Poverty  of  the  most  dis- 
tressing sort,  with  sometimes  the  near  prospect  of  a 
gaol,  embittered  the  remainder  of  his  life.  Chill,  back- 
ward, and  austere  with  strangers,  grave  and  imperious 
in  his  family,  he  was  yet  a  man  of  very  unusual  parts 
and  of  an  affectionate  nature.  On  his  way  through 
life  he  had  remarked  much  upon  other  men,  with  more 
result  in  theory  than  practice ;  and  he  had  reflected 
upon  many  subjects  as  he  delved  the  garden.  His 
great  delight  was  in  solid  conversation  ;  he  would  leave 
his  work  to  talk  with  the  schoolmaster  Murdoch ;  and 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


57 


Robert,  when  he  came  home  late  at  night,  not  only 
turned  aside  rebuke  but  kept  his  father  two  hours 
beside  the  fire  by  the  charm  of  his  merry  and  vigorous 
talk.  Nothing  is  more  characteristic  of  the  class  in 
general,  and  William  Burnes  in  particular,  than  the 
pains  he  took  to  get  proper  schooling  for  his  boys, 
and,  when  that  was  no  longer  possible,  the  sense  and 
resolution  with  which  he  set  himself  to  supply  the 
deficiency  by  his  own  influence.  For  many  years  he 
was  their  chief  companion ;  he  spoke  with  them 
seriously  on  all  subjects  as  if  they  had  been  grown 
men ;  at  night,  when  work  was  over,  he  taught  them 
arithmetic ;  he  borrowed  books  for  them  on  history, 
science,  and  theology ;  and  he  felt  it  his  duty  to  sup- 
plement this  last  —  the  trait  is  laughably  Scottish  — 
by  a  dialogue  of  his  own  composition,  where  his  own 
private  shade  of  orthodoxy  was  exactly  represented. 
He  would  go  to  his  daughter  as  she  stayed  afield  herd- 
ing cattle,  to  teach  her  the  names  of  grasses  and  wild 
flowers,  or  to  sit  by  her  side  when  it  thundered.  Dis- 
tance to  strangers,  deep  family  tenderness,  love  of 
knowledge,  a  narrow,  precise,  and  formal  reading  of 
theology  —  everything  we  learn  of  him  hangs  well 
together,  and  builds  up  a  popular  Scotch  type.  If  I 
mention  the  name  of  Andrew  Fairservice,  it  is  only  as 
I  might  couple  for  an  instant  Dugald  Dalgetty  with 


58 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


old  Marshal  Loudon,  to  help  out  the  reader's  compre- 
hension by  a  popular  but  unworthy  instance  of  a  class. 
Such  was  the  influence  of  this  good  and  wise  man 
that  his  household  became  a  school  to  itself,  and 
neighbours  who  came  into  the  farm  at  meal-time 
would  find  the  whole  family,  father,  brothers,  and 
sisters,  helping  themselves  with  one  hand,  and  holding 
a  book  in  the  other.  We  are  surprised  at  the  prose 
style  of  Robert ;  that  of  Gilbert  need  surprise  us  no 
less ;  even  William  writes  a  remarkable  letter  for  a 
young  man  of  such  slender  opportunities.  One  anec- 
dote marks  the  taste  of  the  family.  Murdoch  brought 
Titus  Andronicus,  and,  with  such  dominie  elocution 
as  we  may  suppose,  began  to  read  it  aloud  before  this 
rustic  audience;  but  when  he  had  reached  the  passage 
where  Tamora  insults  Lavinia,  with  one  voice  and  "  in 
an  agony  of  distress"  they  refused  to  hear  it  to  an  end. 
In  such  a  father  and  with  such  a  home,  Robert  had 
already  the  making  of  an  excellent  education ;  and 
what  Murdoch  added,  although  it  may  not  have  been 
much  in  amount,  was  in  character  the  very  essence  of 
a  literary  training.  Schools  and  colleges,  for  one  great 
man  whom  they  complete,  perhaps  unmake  a  dozen  ; 
the  strong  spirit  can  do  well  upon  more  scanty  fare. 

Robert  steps  before  us,  almost  from  the  first,  in  his 
complete  character  —  a  proud,  headstrong,  impetuous 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


59 


lad,  greedy  of  pleasure,  greedy  of  notice ;  in  his  own 
phrase  "panting  after  distinction,"  and  in  his  brother's 
"cherishing  a  particular  jealousy  of  people  who  were 
richer  or  of  more  consequence  than  himself:"  with 
all  this,  he  was  emphatically  of  the  artist  nature. 
Already  he  made  a  conspicuous  figure  in  Tarbolton 
church,  with  the  only  tied  hair  in  the  parish,  "and  his 
plaid,  which  was  of  a  particular  colour,  wrapped  in  a 
particular  manner  round  his  shoulders."  Ten  years 
later,  when  a  married  man,  the  father  i  f  a  family,  a 
farmer,  and  an  officer  of  Excise,  we  shall  find  him  out 
fishing  in  masquerade,  with  fox-skin  cap,  belted  great- 
coat, and  great  Highland  broadsword.  He  liked 
dressing  up,  in  fact,  for  its  own  sake.  This  is  the 
spirit  which  leads  to  the  extravant  array  of  Latin 
Quarter  students,  and  the  proverbial  velveteen  of  the 
English  landscape-painter;  and,  though  the  pleasure 
derived  is  in  itself  merely  personal,  it  shows  a  man 
who  is,  to  say  the  least  of  it,  not  pained  by  general 
attention  and  remark.  His  father  wrote  the  family 
name  B times ;  Robert  early  adopted  the  orthography 
Burness  from  his  cousin  in  the  Mearns;  and  in  his 
twenty-eighth  year  changed  it  once  more  to  Burns. 
It  is  plain  that  the  last  transformation  was  not  made 
without  some  qualm  ;  for  in  addressing  his  cousin  he 
adheres,  in  at  least  one  more  letter,  to  spelling  number 


6o 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


two.  And  this,  again,  shows  a  man  preoccupied  about 
the  manner  of  his  appearance  even  down  to  the  name, 
and  little  willing  to  follow  custom.  Again,  he  was 
proud,  and  justly  proud,  of  his  powers  in  conversation. 
To  no  other  man's  have  we  the  same  conclusive  testi- 
mony from  different  sources  and  from  every  rank  of 
life.  It  is  almost  a  commonplace  that  the  best  of  his 
works  was  what  he  said  in  talk.  Robertson  the  his- 
torian "scarcely  ever  met  any  man  whose  conversation 
displayed  greater  vigour " ;  the  Duchess  of  Gordon 
declared  that  he  "  carried  her  off  her  feet " ;  and, 
when  he  came  late  to  an  inn,  the  servants  would  get 
out  of  bed  to  hear  him  talk.  But,  in  these  early  days 
at  least,  he  was  determined  to  shine  by  any  means. 
He  made  himself  feared  in  the  village  for  his  tongue. 
He  would  crush  weaker  men  to  their  faces,  or  even 
perhaps  —  for  the  statement  of  Sillar  is  not  absolute  — 
say  cutting  things  of  his  acquaintances  behind  their 
back.  At  the  church  door,  between  sermons,  he 
would  parade  his  religious  views  amid  hisses.  These 
details  stamp  the  man.  He  had  no  genteel  timidities 
in  the  conduct  of  his  life.  He  loved  to  force  his  per- 
sonality upon  the  world.  He  would  please  himself, 
and  shine.  Had  he  lived  in  the  Paris  of  1S30,  and 
joined  his  lot  with  the  Romantics,  we  can  conceive 
him  writing  Jehan  for  Jean,  swaggering  in  Gautier's 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


61 


red  waistcoat,  and  horrifying  Bourgeois  in   a  public 
cafe  with  paradox  and  gasconade. 

A  leading  trait  throughout  his  whole  career  was  his 
desire  to  be  in  love.  Ne  fait  pas  ce  tour  qui  veut.  His 
affections  were  often  enough  touched,  but  perhaps 
never  engaged.  He  was  all  his  life  on  a  voyage  of 
discovery,  but  it  does  not  appear  conclusively  that  he 
ever  touched  the  happy  isle.  A  man  brings  to  love  a 
deal  of  ready-made  sentiment,  and  even  from  child- 
hood obscurely  prognosticates  the  symptoms  of  this 
vital  malady.  Burns  was  formed  for  love ;  he  had 
passion,  tenderness,  and  a  singular  bent  in  the  direc- 
tion ;  rre  could  foresee,  with  the  intuition  of  an  artist, 
what  love  ought  to  be ;  and  he  could  not  conceive  a 
worthy  life  without  it.  But  he  had  ill-fortune,  and  was 
besides  so  greedy  after  every  shadow  of  the  true 
divinity,  and  so  much  the  slave  of  a  strong  tempera- 
ment, that  perhaps  his  nerve  was  relaxed  and  his  heart 
had  lost  the  power  of  self-devotion  before  an  oppor- 
tunity occurred.  The  circumstances  of  his  youth 
doubtless  counted  for  something  in  the  result.  For 
the  lads  of  Ayrshire,  as  soon  as  the  day's  work  was 
over  and  the  beasts  were  stabled,  would  take  the  road, 
it  might  be  in  a  winter  tempest,  and  travel  perhaps 
miles  by  moss  and  moorland  to  spend  an  hour  or  two 
in  courtship.     Rule  10  of  the  Bachelors'  Club  at  Tar- 


62 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


bolton  provides  that  "every  man  proper  for  a  member 
of  this  Society  must  be  a  professed  lover  of  one  or 
more  of  the  female  sex."  The  rich,  as  Burns  himself 
points  out,  may  have  a  choice  of  pleasurable  occupa- 
tions, but  these  lads  had  nothing  but  their  "cannie 
hour  at  e'en."  It  was  upon  love  and  flirtation  that 
this  rustic  society  was  built;  gallantry  was  the  essence 
of  life  among  the  Ayrshire  hills  as  well  as  in  the 
Court  of  Versailles ;  and  the  days  were  distinguished 
from  each  other  by  love-letters,  meetings,  tiffs,  recon- 
ciliations, and  expansions  to  the  chosen  confidant,  as 
in  a  comedy  of  Marivaux.  Here  was  a  field  for  a 
man  of  Burns's  indiscriminate  personal  ambition, 
where  he  might  pursue  his  voyage  of  discovery  in 
quest  of  true  love,  and  enjoy  temporary  triumphs  by 
the  way.  He  was  "  constantly  the  victim  of  some  fair 
enslaver"  —  at  least,  when  it  was  not  the  other  way 
about;  and  there  were  often  underplots  and  secondary 
fair  enslavers  in  the  background.  Many  —  or  may  we 
not  say  most  ? — of  these  affairs  were  entirely  artificial. 
One,  he  tells  us,  he  began  out  of  "a  vanity  of  showing 
his  parts  in  courtship,"  for  he  piqued  himself  on  his 
ability  at  a  love-letter.  But,  however  they  began, 
these  flames  of  his  were  fanned  into  a  passion  ere  the 
end;  and  he  stands  unsurpassed  in  his  power  of  self- 
deception,  and  positively  without  a  competitor  in  the 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


art,  to  use  his  own  words,  "  of  battering  himself  into  a 
warm  affection," — a  debilitating  and  futile  exercise. 
Once  he  had  worked  himself  into  the  vein,  "  the  agita- 
tions of  his  mind  and  body"  were  an  astonishment  to 
all  who  knew  him.  Such  a  course  as  this,  however 
pleasant  to  a  thirsty  vanity,  was  lowering  to  his 
nature.  He  sank  more  and  more  towards  the  pro- 
fessional Don  Juan.  With  a  leer  of  what  the  French 
call  fatuity,  he  bids  the  belles  of  Mauchline  beware  of 
his  seductions ;  and  the  same  cheap  self-satisfaction 
finds  a  yet  uglier  vent  when  he  plumes  himself  on  the 
scandal  at  the  birth  of  his  first  bastard.  We  can  well 
believe  what  we  hear  of  his  facility  in  striking  up  an 
acquaintance  with  women  :  he  would  have  conquering 
manners ;  he  would  bear  down  upon  his  rustic  game 
with  the  grace  that  comes  of  absolute  assurance  —  the 
Richelieu  of  Lochlea  or  Mossgiel.  In  yet  another 
manner  did  these  quaint  ways  of  courtship  help  him 
into  fame.  If  he  were  great  as  principal,  he  was 
unrivalled  as  confidant.  He  could  enter  into  a  pas- 
sion ;  he  could  counsel  wary  moves,  being,  in  his  own 
phrase,  so  old  a  hawk;  nay,  he  could  turn  a  letter  for 
some  unlucky  swain,  or  even  string  a  few  lines  of  verse 
that  should  clinch  the  business  and  fetch  the  hesitat- 
ing fair  one  to  the  ground.  Nor,  perhaps,  was  it  only 
his  "  curiosity,  zeal,  and  intrepid  dexterity"  that  recom- 


64 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


mended  him  for  a  second  in  such  affairs ;  it  must  have 
been  a  distinction  to  have  the  assistance  and  advice  of 
Rab  the  Ranter  ;  and  one  who  was  in  no  way  formida- 
ble by  himself  might  grow  dangerous  and  attractive 
through  the  fame  of  his  associate. 

I  think  we  can  conceive  him,  in  these  early  years,  in 
that  rough  moorland  country,  poor  among  the  poor 
with  his  seven  pounds  a  year,  looked  upon  with  doubt 
by  respectable  elders,  but  for  all  that  the  best  talker, 
the  best  letter-writer,  the  most  famous  lover  and  con- 
fidant, the  laureate  poet,  and  the  only  man  who  wore 
his  hair  tied  in  the  parish.  He  says  he  had  then  as 
high  a  notion  of  himself  as  ever  after;  and  I  can  well 
believe  it.  Among  the  youth  he  walked  facile  prin- 
ceps,  an  apparent  god ;  and  even  if,  from  time  to  time, 
the  Reverend  Mr.  Auld  should  swoop  upon  him  with  the 
thunders  of  the  Church,  and,  in  company  with  seven 
others,  Rab  the  Ranter  must  figure  some  fine  Sunday 
on  the  stool  of  repentance,  would  there  not  be  a  sort 
of  glory,  an  infernal  apotheosis,  in  so  conspicuous  a 
shame  ?  Was  not  Richelieu  in  disgrace  more  idolised 
than  ever  by  the  dames  of  Paris  ?  and  when  was  the 
highwayman  most  acclaimed  but  on  his  way  to  Tyburn  ? 
Or,  to  take  a  simile  from  nearer  home,  and  still  more 
exactly  to  the  point,  what  could  even  corporal  punish- 
ment avail,  administered  by  a  cold,  abstract,  unearthly 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


65 


schoolmaster,  against  the  influence  and  fame  of  the 
school's  hero? 

And  now  we  come  to  the  culminating  point  of 
Burns's  early  period.  He  began  to  be  received  into 
the  unknown  upper  world.  His  fame  soon  spread 
from  among  his  fellow-rebels  on  the  benches,  and 
began  to  reach  the  ushers  and  monitors  of  this  great 
Ayrshire  academy.  This  arose  in  part  from  his  lax 
views  about  religion ;  for  at  this  time  that  old  war  of 
the  creeds  and  confessors,  which  is  always  grumbling 
from  end  to  end  of  our  poor  Scotland,  brisked  up  in 
these  parts  into  a  hot  and  virulent  skirmish ;  and 
Burns  found  himself  identified  with  the  opposition 
party,  —  a  clique  of  roaring  lawyers  and  half-heretical 
divines,  with  wit  enough  to  appreciate  the  value  of  the 
poet's  help,  and  not  sufficient  taste  to  moderate  his 
grossness  and  personality.  We  may  judge  of  their 
surprise  when  Holy  Willie  was  put  into  their  hand ; 
like  the  amorous  lads  of  Tarbolton,  they  recognised 
in  him  the  best  of  seconds.  His  satires  began  to  go 
the  round  in  manuscript;  Mr.  Aiken,  one  of  the  law- 
yers, "read  him  into  fame";  he  himself  was  soon 
welcome  in  many  houses  of  a  better  sort,  where  his 
admirable  talk,  and  his  manners,  which  he  had  direct 
from  his  Maker,  except  for  a  brush  he  gave  them  at  a 
country  dancing  school,  completed  what  his  poems 


66 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


had  begun.  We  have  a  sight  of  him  at  his  first  visit 
to  Adamhill,  in  his  ploughman's  shoes,  coasting  around 
the  carpet  as  though  that  were  sacred  ground.  But 
he  soon  grew  used  to  carpets  and  their  owners ;  and 
he  was  still  the  superior  of  all  whom  he  encountered, 
and  ruled  the  roost  in  conversation.  Such  was  the 
impression  made,  that  a  young  clergyman,  himself  a 
man  of  ability,  trembled  and  became  confused  when  he 
saw  Robert  enter  the  church  in  which  he  was  to 
preach.  It  is  not  surprising  that  the  poet  determined 
to  publish  :  he  had  now  stood  the  test  of  some  public- 
ity, and  under  this  hopeful  impulse  he  composed  in  six 
winter  months  the  bulk  of  his  more  important  poems. 
Here  was  a  young  man  who,  from  a  very  humble  place, 
was  mounting  rapidly  ;  from  the  cynosure  of  a  parish, 
he  had  become  the  talk  of  a  county ;  once  the  bard 
of  rural  courtships,  he  was  now  about  to  appear  as  a 
bound  and  printed  poet  in  the  world's  bookshops. 

A  few  more  intimate  strokes  are  necessary  to  complete 
the  sketch.  This  strong  young  ploughman,  who  feared 
no  competitor  with  the  flail,  suffered  like  a  fine  lady 
from  sleeplessness  and  vapours  ;  he  would  fall  into  the 
blackest  melancholies,  and  be  filled  with  remorse  for 
the  past  and  terror  for  the  future.  He  was  still  not 
perhaps  devoted  to  religion,  but  haunted  by  it;  and 
at  a  touch  of  sickness  prostrated  himself  before  God 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


67 


in  what  I  can  only  call  unmanly  penitence.  As  he 
had  aspirations  beyond  his  place  in  the  world,  so 
he  had  tastes,  thoughts,  and  weaknesses  to  match. 
He  loved  to  walk  under  a  wood  to  the  sound  of  a 
winter  tempest;  he  had  a  singular  tenderness  for  ani- 
mals; he  carried  a  book  with  him  in  his  pocket  when 
he  went  abroad,  and  wore  out  in  this  service  two  copies 
of  the  Man  of  Feeling.  With  young  people  in  the 
field  at  work  he  was  very  long-suffering;  and  when 
his  brother  Gilbert  spoke  sharply  to  them  —  "  O  man, 
ye  are  no  for  young  folk,"  he  would  say,  and  give  the 
defaulter  a  helping  hand  and  a  smile.  In  the  hearts 
of  the  men  whom  he  met,  he  read  as  in  a  book ;  and, 
what  is  yet  more  rare,  his  knowledge  of  himself 
equalled  his  knowledge  of  others.  There  are  no  truer 
things  said  of  Burns  than  what  is  to  be  found  in  his 
own  letters.  Country  Don  Juan  as  he  was,  he  had 
none  of  that  blind  vanity  which  values  itself  on  what 
it  is  not;  he  knew  his  own  strength  and  weakness  to 
a  hair:  he  took  himself  boldly  for  what  he  was,  and, 
except  in  moments  of  hypochondria,  declared  himself 
content. 

THE   LOVE    STORIES 


On  the  night  of  Mauchline  races,  1785,  the  young 
men  and  women  of  the  place  joined  in  a  penny  ball, 


68 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


according  to  their  custom.  In  the  same  set  danced 
Jean  Armour,  the  master-mason's  daughter,  and  our 
dark-eyed  Don  Juan.  His  dog  (not  the  immortal 
Luath,  but  a  successor  unknown  to  fame,  caret  quia 
vate  sacro),  apparently  sensible  of  some  neglect,  fol- 
lowed his  master  to  and  fro,  to  the  confusion  of  the 
dancers.  Some  mirthful  comments  followed;  and 
Jean  heard  the  poet  say  to  his  partner  —  or,  as  I 
should  imagine,  laughingly  launch  the  remark  to  the 
company  at  large  —  that  "  he  wished  he  could  get  any 
of  the  lasses  to  like  him  as  well  as  his  dog."  Some 
time  after,  as  the  girl  was  bleaching  clothes  on  Mauch- 
line  green,  Robert  chanced  to  go  by,  still  accompanied 
by  his  dog ;  and  the  dog,  "  scouring  in  long  excursion," 
scampered  with  four  black  paws  across  the  linen. 
This  brought  the  two  into  conversation;  when  Jean, 
with  a  somewhat  hoydenish  advance,  inquired  if  "  he 
had  yet  got  any  of  the  lasses  to  like  him  as  well  as  his 
dog  ? "  It  is  one  of  the  misfortunes  of  the  professional 
Don  Juan  that  his  honour  forbids  him  to  re-refuse 
battle ;  he  is  in  life  like  the  Roman  soldier  upon  duty, 
or  like  the  sworn  physician  who  must  attend  on  all 
diseases.  Burns  accepted  the  provocation;  hungry 
hope  reawakened  in  his  heart;  here  was  a  girl  — 
pretty,  simple  at  least,  if  not  honestly  stupid,  and 
plainly  not  averse  to  his  attentions;  it  seemed  to  him 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


69 


once  more  as  if  love  might  here  be  waiting  him.  Had 
he  but  known  the  truth !  for  this  facile  and  empty- 
headed  girl  had  nothing  more  in  view  than  a  flirta- 
tion;  and  her  heart,  from  the  first  and  on  to  the  end 
of  her  story,  was  engaged  by  another  man.  Burns 
once  more  commenced  the  celebrated  process  of 
"  battering  himself  into  a  warm  affection  " ;  and  the 
proofs  of  his  success  are  to  be  found  in  many  verses 
of  the  period.  Nor  did  he  succeed  with  himself  only  ; 
Jean,  with  her  heart  still  elsewhere,  succumbed  to  his 
fascination,  and  early  in  the  next  year  the  natural  con- 
sequence became  manifest.  It  was  a  heavy  stroke  for 
this  unfortunate  couple.  They  had  trifled  with  life,  and 
were  now  rudely  reminded  of  life's  serious  issues.  Jean 
awoke  to  the  ruin  of  her  hopes ;  the  best  she  had  now 
to  expect  was  marriage  with  a  man  who  was  a  stranger 
to  her  dearest  thoughts ;  she  might  now  be  glad  if 
she  could  get  what  she  would  never  have  chosen.  As 
for  Burns,  at  the  stroke  of  the  calamity  he  recognised 
that  his  voyage  of  discovery  had  led  him  into  a  wrong 
hemisphere — that  he  was  not,  and  never  had  been, 
really  in  love  with  Jean.  Hear  him  in  the  pressure  of 
the  hour.  "Against  two  things,"  he  writes,  "I  am  as 
fixed  as  fate  —  staying  at  home,  and  owning  her  con- 
jugally. The  first,  by  heaven,  I  will  not  do  I  —  the  last, 
by  hell,  I  will  never  do  !"  And  then  he  adds,  perhaps 


7° 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


already  in  a  more  relenting  temper:  "If  you  see  Jean, 
tell  her  I  will  meet  her,  so  God  help  me  in  my  hour  of 
need."  They  met  accordingly;  and  Burns,  touched 
with  her  misery,  came  down  from  these  heights  of 
independence,  and  gave  her  a  written  acknowledgment 
of  marriage.  It  is  the  punishment  of  Don  Juanism  to 
create  continually  false  positions  —  relations  in  life 
which  are  wrong  in  themselves,  and  which  it  is  equally 
wrong  to  break  or  to  perpetuate.  This  was  such  a 
case.  Worldly  Wiseman  would  have  laughed  and 
gone  his  way;  let  us  be  glad  that  Burns  was  better 
counselled  by  his  heart.  When  we  discover  that  we 
can  be  no  longer  true,  the  next  best  is  to  be  kind.  I 
daresay  he  came  away  from  that  interview  not  very 
content,  but  with  a  glorious  conscience;  and  as  he 
went  homeward,  he  would  sing  his  favourite,  "How 
are  Thy  servants  blest,  O  Lord !  "  Jean,  on  the  other 
hand,  armed  with  her  "lines,"  confided  her  position  to 
the  master-mason,  her  father,  and  his  wife.  Burns 
and  his  brother  were  then  in  a  fair  way  to  ruin  them- 
selves in  their  farm ;  the  poet  was  an  execrable  match 
for  any  well-to-do  country  lass;  and  perhaps  old 
Armour  had  an  inkling  of  a  previous  attachment  on 
his  daughter's  part.  At  least,  he  was  not  so  much 
incensed  by  her  slip  from  virtue  as  by  the  marriage 
which   had  been  designed  to   cover   it.     Of   this    he 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


7i 


would  not  hear  a  word.  Jean,  who  had  besought  the 
acknowledgment  only  to  appease  her  parents,  and  not 
at  all  from  any  violent  inclination  to  the  poet,  readily 
gave  up  the  paper  for  destruction  ;  and  all  parties 
imagined,  although  wrongly,  that  the  marriage  was 
thus  dissolved.  To  a  proud  man  like  Bums  here  was 
a  crushing  blow.  The  concession  which  had  been 
wrung  from  his  pity  was  now  publicly  thrown  back  in 
his  teeth.  The  Armour  family  preferred  disgrace  to  his 
connection.  Since  the  promise,  besides,  he  had  doubt- 
less been  busy  "battering  himself"  back  again  into 
his  affection  for  the  girl ;  and  the  blow  would  not  only 
take  him  in  his  vanity,  but  wound  him  at  the  heart. 

He  relieved  himself  in  verse;  but  for  such  a  smart- 
ing affront  manuscript  poetry  was  insufficient  to  con- 
sole him.  He  must  find  a  more  powerful  remedy  in 
good  flesh  and  blood,  and  after  this  discomfiture,  set 
forth  again  at  once  upon  his  voyage  of  discovery  in 
quest  of  love.  It  is  perhaps  one  of  the  most  touching 
things  in  human  nature,  as  it  is  a  commonplace  of 
psychology,  that  when  a  man  has  just  lost  hope  or 
confidence  in  one  love,  he  is  then  most  eager  to  find 
and  lean  upon  another.  The  universe  could  not  be 
yet  exhausted ;  there  must  be  hope  and  love  waiting 
for  him  somewhere;  and  so,  with  his  head  down,  this 
poor,  insulted   poet   ran    once    more    upon    his   fate. 


72 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


There  was  an  innocent  and  gentle  Highland  nursery- 
maid at  service  in  a  neighbouring  family ;  and  he  had 
soon  battered  himself  and  her  into  a  warm  affection 
and  a  secret  engagement.  Jean's  marriage  lines  had 
not  been  destroyed  till  March  13,  1786;  yet  all  was 
settled  between  Burns  and  Mary  Campbell  by  Sunday, 
May  14,  when  they  met  for  the  last  time  and  said 
farewell  with  rustic  solemnities  upon  the  banks  of  Ayr. 
They  each  wet  their  hands  in  a  stream,  and,  standing 
one  on  either  bank,  held  a  Bible  between  them  as  they 
vowed  eternal  faith.  Then  they  exchanged  Bibles,  on 
one  of  which  Burns,  for  greater  security,  had  inscribed 
texts  as  to  the  binding  nature  of  an  oath;  and  surely, 
if  ceremony  can  do  aught  to  fix  the  wandering  affec- 
tions, here  were  two  people  united  for  life.  Mary 
came  of  a  superstitious  family ;  so  that  she  perhaps 
insisted  on  these  rites;  but  they  must  have  been  emi- 
nently to  the  taste  of  Burns  at  this  period;  for  nothing 
would  seem  superfluous,  and  no  oath  great  enough,  to 
stay  his  tottering  constancy. 

Events  of  consequence  now  happened  thickly  in  the 
poet's  life.  His  book  was  announced;  the  Armours 
sought  to  summon  him  at  law  for  the  aliment  of  the 
child;  he  lay  here  and  there  in  hiding  to  correct  the 
sheets;  he  wTas  under  an  engagement  for  Jamaica, 
where  Mary  was  to  join  him  as  his  wife ;  now  he  had 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


73 


"orders  within  three  weeks  at  latest  to  repair  aboard 
the  ATancy,  Captain  Smith  ;  "  now  his  chest  was  already 
on  the  road  to  Greenock;  and  now,  in  the  wild 
autumn  weather  on  the  moorland,  he  measures  verses 
of  farewell :  — 


"  The  bursting  tears  my  heart  declare  ; 
Farewell  the  bonny  banks  of  Ayr  !  " 

But  the  great  master  dramatist  had  secretly  another 
intention  for  the  piece;  by  the  most  violent  and  com- 
plicated solution,  in  which  death  and  birth  and  sudden 
fame  all  play  a  part  as  interposing  deities,  the  act-drop 
fell  upon  a  scene  of  transformation.  Jean  was  brought 
to  bed  of  twins,  and,  by  an  amicable  arrangement,  the 
Burnses  took  the  boy  to  biing  up  by  hand,  while  the  girl 
remained  with  her  mother.  The  success  of  the  book 
was  immediate  and  emphatic;  it  put  £2.0  at  once  into 
the  author's  pur.se;  and  he  was  encouraged  upon  all 
hands  to  go  to  Edinburgh  and  push  his  success  in  a 
second  and  larger  edition.  Third  and  last  in  these 
series  of  interpositions,  a  letter  came  one  day  to  Moss- 
giel  Farm  for  Robert.  He  went  to  the  window  to  read 
it;  a  sudden  change  came  over  his  face,  and  he  left 
the  room  without  a  word.  Years  afterwards,  when  the 
story  began  to  leak  out,  his  family  understood  that  he 
had  then  learned  the  death  of  Highland  Mary.     Except 


74 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


in  a  few  poems  and  a  few  dry  indications  purposely 
misleading  as  to  date,  Burns  himself  made  no  reference 
to  this  passage  of  his  life ;  it  was  an  adventure  of 
which,  for  I  think  sufficient  reasons,  he  desired  to  bury 
the  details.  Of  one  thing  we  may  be  glad :  in  after 
years  he  visited  the  poor  girl's  mother,  and  left  her 
with  the  impression  that  he  was  "  a  real  warm-hearted 
chield." 

Perhaps  a  month  after  he  received  this  intelligence, 
he  set  out  for  Edinburgh  on  a  pony  he  had  borrowed 
from  a  friend.  The  town  that  winter  was  "agog  with 
the  ploughman  poet."  Robertson,  Dugald  Stewart, 
Blair,  "  Duchess  Gordon  and  all  the  gay  world,"  were 
of  his  acquaintance.  Such  a  revolution  is  not  to  be 
found  in  literary  history.  He  was  now,  it  must  be 
remembered,  twenty-seven  years  of  age ;  he  had  fought 
since  his  early  boyhood  an  obstinate  battle  against 
poor  soil,  bad  seed,  and  inclement  seasons,  wading 
deep  in  Ayrshire  mosses,  guiding  the  plough  in  the 
furrow,  wielding  "the  thresher's  weary  flingin'-tree  ;  " 
and  his  education,  his  diet,  and  his  pleasures,  had  been 
those  of  a  Scotch  countryman.  Now  he  stepped  forth 
suddenly  among  the  polite  and  learned.  We  can  see 
him  as  he  then  was,  in  his  boots  and  buckskins,  his 
blue  coat  and  waistcoat  striped  with  buff  and  blue,  like 
a  farmer  in  his  Sunday  best ;  the  heavy  ploughman's 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


75 


figure  firmly  planted  on  its  burly  legs;  his  face  full  of 
sense  and  shrewdness,  and  with  a  somewhat  melan- 
choly air  of  thought,  and  his  large  dark  eye  "  literally 
glowing"  as  he  spoke.  "I  never  saw  such  another 
eye  in  a  human  head,"  says  Walter  Scott,  "  though  I 
have  seen  the  most  distinguished  men  of  my  time." 
With  men,  whether  they  were  lords  or  omnipotent 
critics,  his  manner  was  plain,  dignified,  and  free  from 
bashful ness  or  affectation.  If  he  made  a  slip,  he  had 
the  social  courage  to  pass  on  and  refrain  from  explana- 
tion. He  was  not  embarrassed  in  this  society,  because 
he  read  and  judged  the  men;  he  could  spy  snobbery 
in  a  titled  lord ;  and,  as  for  the  critics,  he  dismissed 
their  system  in  an  epigram.  "  These  gentlemen,"  said 
he,  "  remind  me  of  some  spinsters  in  my  country  who 
spin  their  thread  so  fine  that  it  is  neither  fit  for  weft 
nor  woof."  Ladies,  on  the  other  hand,  surprised  him  ; 
he  was  scarce  commander  of  himself  in  their  society ;  he 
was  disqualified  by  his  acquired  nature  as  a  Don  Juan  ; 
and  he,  who  had  been  so  much  at  his  ease  with  country 
lasses,  treated  the  town  dames  to  an  extreme  of  defer- 
ence. One  lady,  who  met  him  at  a  ball,  gave  Chambers 
a  speaking  sketch  of  his  demeanour.  "  His  manner 
was  not  prepossessing  —  scarcely,  she  thinks,  manly  or 
natural.  It  seemed  as  if  he  affected  a  rusticity  or  land- 
ertness,  so  that  when  he  said  the  music  was  '  bonnie, 


76 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


bonnie,'  it  was  like  the  expression  of  a  child."  These 
would  be  company  manners ;  and  doubtless  on  a  slight 
degree  of  intimacy  the  affectation  would  grow  less. 
And  his  talk  to  women  had  always  "  a  turn  either  to 
the  pathetic  or  humorous,  which  engaged  the  attention 
particularly." 

The  Edinburgh  magnates  (to  conclude  this  episode 
at  once)  behaved  well  to  Burns  from  first  to  last. 
Were  heaven-born  genius  to  revisit  us  in  similar  guise, 
I  am  not  venturing  too  far  when  I  say  that  he  need 
expect  neither  so  warm  a  welcome  nor  such  solid  help. 
Although  Burns  was  only  a  peasant,  and  one  of  no 
very  elegant  reputation  as  to  morals,  he  was  made 
welcome  to  their  homes.  They  gave  him  a  great  deal 
of  good  advice,  helped  him  to  some  five  hundred 
pounds  of  ready  money,  and  got  him,  as  soon  as  he 
asked  it,  a  place  in  the  Excise.  Burns,  on  his  part, 
bore  the  elevation  with  perfect  dignity ;  and  with  per- 
fect dignity  returned,  when  the  time  had  come,  into 
a  country  privacy  of  life.  His  powerful  sense  never 
deserted  him,  and  from  the  first  he  recognised  that  his 
Edinburgh  popularity  was  but  an  ovation  and  the 
affair  of  a  day.  He  wrote  a  few  letters  in  a  high-flown, 
bombastic  vein  of  gratitude  ;  but  in  practice  he  suffered 
no  man  to  intrude  upon  his  self-respect.  On  the  other 
hand,  he  never  turned  his  back,  even  for  a  moment,  on 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


77 


his  old  associates  ;  and  he  was  always  ready  to  sacrifice 
an  acquaintance  to  a  friend,  although  the  acquaintance 
were  a  duke.  He  would  be  a  bold  man  who  should 
promise  similar  conduct  in  equally  exacting  circum- 
stances. It  was,  in  short,  an  admirable  appearance  on 
the  stage  of  life  —  socially  successful,  intimately  self- 
respecting,  and  like  a  gentleman  from  first  to  last. 

In  the  present  study,  this  must  only  be  taken  by  the 
way,  while  we  return  to  Burns's  love  affairs.  Even  on 
the  road  to  Edinburgh  he  had  seized  upon  the  oppor- 
tunity of  a  flirtation,  and  had  carried  the  "battering" 
so  far  that  when  he  next  moved  from  town,  it  was  to 
steal  two  days  with  this  anonymous  fair  one.  The 
exact  importance  to  Burns  of  this  affair  may  be  gath- 
ered from  the  song  in  which  he  commemorated  its 
occurrence.  "I  love  the  dear  lassie,"  he  sings,  "be- 
cause she  loves  me";  or,  in  the  tongue  of  prose: 
"  Finding  an  opportunity,  I  did  not  hesitate  to  profit 
by  it ;  and  even  now,  if  it  returned,  I  should  not  hesi- 
tate to  profit  by  it  again."  A  love  thus  founded  has 
no  interest  for  mortal  man.  Meantime,  early  in  the 
winter,  and  only  once,  we  find  him  regretting  Jean  in 
his  correspondence.  "  Because  "  — such  is  his  reason 
—  "because  he  does  not  think  he  will  ever  meet  so 
delicious  an  armful  again;"  and  then,  after  a  brief 
excursion  into  verse,  he  goes  straight  on  to  describe 


78 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


a  new  episode  in  the  voyage  of  discovery  with  the 
daughter  of  a  Lothian  farmer  for  a  heroine.  I  must 
ask  the  reader  to  follow  all  these  references  to  his 
future  wife ;  they  are  essential  to  the  comprehension 
of  Burns's  character  and  fate.  In  June,  we  find  him 
back  at  Mauchline,  a  famous  man.  There,  the  Armour 
family  greeted  him  with  a  "  mean,  servile  compliance," 
which  increased  his  former  disgust.  Jean  was  not  less 
compliant;  a  second  time  the  poor  girl  submitted  to 
the  fascination  of  the  man  whom  she  did  not  love,  and 
whom  she  had  so  cruelly  insulted  little  more  than  a 
year  ago ;  and,  though  Burns  took  advantage  of  her 
weakness,  it  was  in  the  ugliest  and  most  cynical  spirit, 
and  with  a  heart  absolutely  indifferent.  Judge  of  this 
by  a  letter  written  some  twenty  days  after  his  return  — 
a  letter  to  my  mind  among  the  most  degrading  in  the 
whole  collection  —  a  letter  which  seems  to  have  been 
inspired  by  a  boastful,  libertine  bagman.  "  I  am 
afraid,"  it  goes,  "I  have  almost  ruined  one  source, 
the  principal  one,  indeed,  of  my  former  happiness  —  the 
eternal  propensity  I  always  had  to  fall  in  love.  My 
heart  no  more  glows  with  feverish  rapture ;  I  have  no 
paradisaical  evening  interviews."  Even  the  process 
of  "battering"  has  failed  him,  you  perceive.  Still  he 
had  some  one  in  his  eye  —  a  lady,  if  you  please,  with 
a  fine  figure  and  elegant  manners,  and  who  had  "seen 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


79 


the  politest  quarters  in  Europe."  "  I  frequently  visited 
her,"  he  writes,  "and  after  passing  regularly  the  inter- 
mediate degrees  between  the  distant  formal  bow  and 
the  familiar  grasp  round  the  waist,  I  ventured,  in  my 
careless  way,  to  talk  of  friendship  in  rather  ambiguous 

terms ;  and  after  her  return  to ,  I  wrote  her  in 

the  same  terms.  Miss,  construing  my  remarks  further 
than  even  I  intended,  flew  off  in  a  tangent  of  female 
dignity  and  reserve,  like  a  mountain  lark  in  an  April 
morning;  and  wrote  me  an  answer  which  measured 
out  very  completely  what  an  immense  way  I  had  to 
travel  before  I  could  reach  the  climate  of  her  favours. 
But  I  am  an  old  hawk  at  the  sport,  and  wrote  her  such 
a  cool,  deliberate,  prudent  reply,  as  brought  my  bird 
from  her  aerial  towerings,  pop,  down  to  my  foot,  like 
Corporal  Trim's  hat."  I  avow  a  carnal  longing,  after 
this  transcription,  to  buffet  the  Old  Hawk  about  the 
ears.  There  is  little  question  that  to  this  lady  he  must 
have  repeated  his  addresses,  and  that  he  was  by  her 
(Miss  Chalmers)  eventually,  though  not  at  all  unkindly, 
rejected.  One  more  detail  to  characterise  the  period. 
Six  months  after  the  date  of  this  letter,  Burns,  back 
in  Edinburgh,  is  served  with  a  writ  in  meditatione 
fugCB,  on  behalf  of  some  Edinburgh  fair  one,  probably 
of  humble  rank,  who  declared  an  intention  of  adding 
to  his  family. 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


About  the  beginning  of  December  (1787),  a  new 
period  opens  in  the  story  of  the  poet's  random  affec- 
tions. He  met  at  a  tea  party  one  Mrs.  Agnes 
M'Lehose,  a  married  woman  of  about  his  own  age, 
who,  with  her  two  children,  had  been  deserted  by  an 
unworthy  husband.  She  had  wit,  could  use  her  pen, 
and  had  read  Werther  with  attention.  Sociable,  and 
even  somewhat  frisky,  there  was  a  good,  sound,  human 
kernel  in  the  woman ;  a  warmth  of  love,  strong  dog- 
matic religious  feeling,  and  a  considerable,  but  not 
authoritative,  sense  of  the  proprieties.  Of  what  biog- 
raphers refer  to  daintily  as  "  her  somewhat  voluptuous 
style  of  beauty,"  judging  from  the  silhouette  in  Mr. 
Scott  Douglas's  invaluable  edition,  the  reader  will  be 
fastidious  if  he  dots  not  approve.  Take  her  for  all  in 
all.  I  believe  she  was  the  best  woman  Burns  encount- 
ered. The  pair  took  a  fancy  for  each  other  on  the 
spot;  Mrs.  M'Lehose,  in  her  turn,  invited  him  to  tea; 
but  the  poet,  in  his  character  of  the  Old  Hawk,  pre 
f  erred  a  tete-a-tete,  excused  himself  at  the  last  moment, 
and  offered  a  visit  instead.  An  accident  confined  him 
to  his  room  for  nearly  a  month,  and  this  led  to  the 
famous  Clarinda  and  Sylvander  correspondence.  It 
was  begun  in  simple  sport;  they  are  already  at  their 
fifth  or  sixth  exchange,  when  Clarinda  writes  :  "  It  is 
really  curious  so  much /un  passing  between  two  per- 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


sons  who  saw  each  other  only  once" ;  but  it  is  hardly 
safe  for  a  man  and  woman  in  the  flower  of  their  years 
to  write  almost  daily,  and  sometimes  in  terms  too 
ambiguous,  sometimes  in  terms  too  plain,  and  gener- 
ally in  terms  too  warm,  for  mere  acquaintance.  The 
exercise  partakes  a  little  of  the  nature  of  battering, 
and  danger  may  be  apprehended  when  next  they  meet. 
It  is  difficult  to  give  any  account  of  this  remarkable 
correspondence;  it  is  too  far  away  from  us,  and  per- 
haps, not  yet  far  enough,  in  point  of  time  and  manner ; 
the  imagination  is  baffled  by  these  stilted  literary 
utterances,  warming,  in  bravura  passages,  into  down- 
right truculent  nonsense.  Clarinda  has  one  famous 
sentence  in  which  she  bids  Sylvander  connect  the 
thought  of  his  mistress  with  the  changing  phases  of 
the  year;  it  was  enthusiastically  admired  by  the  swain, 
but  on  the  modern  mind  produces  mild  amazement 
and  alarm.  "  Oh,  Clarinda,"  writes  Burns,  "  shall  we 
not  meet  in  a  state  —  some  yet  unknown  state  —  of 
being,  where  the  lavish  hand  of  Plenty  shall  minister 
to  the  highest  wish  of  Benovolence,  and  where  the 
chill  north  wind  of  Prudence  shall  never  blow  over 
the  flowery  field  of  Enjoyment?"  The  design  may 
be  that  of  an  Old  Hawk,  but  the  style  is  more  sug- 
gestive of  a  Bird  of  Paradise.  It  is  sometimes  hard  to 
fancy  they  are  not  gravely  making  fun  of  each  other 


82 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


as  they  write.  Religion,  poetry,  love,  and  charming 
sensibility,  are  the  current  topics.  "I  am  delighted, 
charming  Clarinda,  with  your  honest  enthusiasm  for 
religion,"  writes  Burns;  and  the  pair  entertained  a 
fiction  that  this  was  their  "  favourite  subject."  "  This 
is  Sunday,"  writes  the  lady,  "and  not  a  word  on  our 
favourite  subject.  O  fy!  'divine  Clarinda!'"  I  sus- 
pect, although  quite  unconsciously  on  the  part  of  the 
lady,  who  was  bent  on  his  redemption,  they  but  used 
the  favourite  subject  as  a  stalking-horse.  In  the 
meantime,  the  sportive  acquaintance  was  ripening 
steadily  into  a  genuine  passion.  Visits  took  place, 
and  then  became  frequent.  Clarinda's  friends  were 
hurt  and  suspicious ;  her  clergyman  interfered ;  she 
herself  had  smart  attacks  of  conscience ;  but  her  heart 
had  gone  from  her  control;  it  was  altogether  his,  and 
she  "counted  all  things  but  loss  —  heaven  excepted  — 
that  she  might  win  and  keep  him."  Burns  himself 
was  transported  while  in  her  neighbourhood,  but  his 
transports  somewhat  rapidly  declined  during  an 
absence.  I  am  tempted  to  imagine  that,  womanlike, 
he  took  on  the  colour  of  his  mistress's  feeling;  that 
he  could  not  but  heat  himself  at  the  fire  of  her 
unaffected  passion;  but  that,  like  one  who  should 
leave  the  hearth  upon  a  winter's  night,  his  tempera- 
ture soon  fell  when  he  was  out  of  sight,  and  in  a  word, 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


83 


though  he  could  share  the  symptoms,  that  he  had 
never  shared  the  disease.  At  the  same  time,  amid 
the  fustian  of  the  letters  there  are  forcible  and  true 
expressions,  and  the  love  verses  that  he  wrote  upon 
Clarinda  are  among  the  most  moving  in  the  language. 
We  are  approaching  the  solution.  In  mid-winter, 
Jean,  once  more  in  the  family  way,  was  turned  out  of 
doors  by  her  family ;  and  Burns  had  her  received 
and  cared  for  in  the  house  of  a  friend.  For  he 
remained  to  the  last  imperfect  in  his  character  of 
Don  Juan,  and  lacked  the  sinister  courage  to  desert 
his  victim.  About  the  middle  of  February  (17S8),  he 
had  to  tear  himself  from  his  Clarinda  and  make  a 
journey  into  the  southwest  on  business.  Clarinda 
gave  him  two  shirts  for  his  little  son.  They  were 
daily  to  meet  in  prayer  at  an  appointed  hour.  Burns, 
too  late  for  the  post  at  Glasgow,  sent  her  a  letter  by 
parcel  that  she  might  not  have  to  wait.  Clarinda  on 
her  part  writes,  this  time  with  a  beautiful  simplicity: 
"  I  think  the  streets  look  deserted-like  since  Monday  ; 
and  there's  a  certain  insipidity  in  good  kind  folks  I 
once  enjoyed  not  a  little.  Miss  Wardrobe  supped 
here  on  Monday.  She  once  named  you,  which  kept 
me  from  falling  asleep.  I  drank  your  health  in  a  glass 
of  ale  —  as  the  lasses  do  at  Hallowe'en — 'in  to 
mysel'.'"     Arrived  at  Mauchline,  Burns  installed  Jean 


84 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


Armour  in  a  lodging,  and  prevailed  on  Mrs.  Armour 
to  promise  her  help  and  countenance  in  the  approach- 
ing confinement.  This  was  kind  at  least ;  but  hear 
his  expressions :  "  I  have  taken  her  a  room ;  I  have 
taken  her  to  my  arms  ;  I  have  given  her  a  mahogany 

bed;  I  have  given  her  a  guinea I  swore  her 

privately  and  solemnly  never  to  attempt  any  claim  on 
me  as  a  husband,  even  though  anybody  should  per- 
suade her  she  had  such  a  claim  —  which  she  has  not, 
neither  during  my  life  nor  after  my  death.  She  did 
all  this  like  a  good  girl."  And  then  he  took  advan- 
tage of  the  situation.  To  Clarinda  he  wrote:  "I  this 
morning  called  for  a  certain  woman.  I  am  disgusted 
with  her;  I  cannot  endure  her;"  and  he  accused  her 
of  "  tasteless  insipidity,  vulgarity  of  soul,  and  merce- 
nary fawning."  This  was  already  in  March ;  by  the 
thirteenth  of  that  month  he  was  back  in  Edinburgh. 
On  the  17th  he  wrote  to  Clarinda:  "Your  hopes, 
your  fears,  your  cares,  my  love,  are  mine ;  so  don't 
mind  them.  I  will  take  you  in  my  hand  through  the 
dreary  wilds  of  this  world,  and  scare  away  the  raven- 
ing bird  or  beast  that  would  annoy  you."  Again,  on 
the  2 1st:  "Will  you  open,  with  satisfaction  and 
delight,  a  letter  from  a  man  who  loves  you,  who  has 
loved  you,  and  who  will  love  you,  to  death,  through 
death,  and  for  ever.    .    .    .    How  rich  am  I   to    have 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


85 


such  a  treasure  as  you!  .  .  .  'The  Lord  God  know- 
eth,'  and,  perhaps,  'Israel  he  shall  know,'  my  love 
and  your  merit.  Adieu,  Clarinda!  I  am  going  to 
remember  you  in  my  prayers."  By  the  7th  of  April, 
seventeen  days  later,  he  had  already  decided  to  make 
Jean  Armour  publicly  his  wife. 

A  more  astonishing  stage-trick  is  not  to  be  found. 
And  yet  his  conduct  is  seen,  upon  a  nearer  examina- 
tion, to  be  grounded  both  in  reason  and  in  kindness. 
He  was  now  about  to  embark  on  a  solid  worldly 
career ;  he  had  taken  a  farm  ;  the  affair  with  Clarinda, 
however  gratifying  to  his  heart,  was  too  contingent 
to  offer  any  great  consolation  to  a  man  like  Burns,  to 
whom  marriage  must  have  seemed  the  very  dawn  of 
hope  and  self-respect.  This  is  to  regard  the  question 
from  its  lowest  aspect;  but  there  is  no  doubt  that  he 
entered  on  this  new  period  of  his  life  with  a  sincere 
determination  to  do  right.  He  had  just  helped  his 
brother  with  a  loan  of  a  hundred  and  eighty  pounds; 
should  he  do  nothing  for  the  poor  girl  whom  he  had 
ruined  ?  It  was  true  he  could  not  do  as  he  did  without 
brutally  wounding  Clarinda;  that  was  the  punishment 
of  his  bygone  fault ;  he  was,  as  he  truly  says,  "  damned 
with  a  choice  only  of  different  species  of  error  and 
misconduct."  To  be  professional  Don  Juan,  to  accept 
the  provocation  of  any  lively  lass  upon   the  village 


86 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


green,  may  thus  lead  a  man  through  a  series  of  detest- 
able words  and  actions,  and  land  him  at  last  in  an 
undesired  and  most  unsuitable  union  for  life.  If  he 
had  been  strong  enough  to  refrain  or  bad  enough  to 
persevere  in  evil ;  if  he  had  only  not  been  Don  Juan 
at  all,  or  been  Don  Juan  altogether,  there  had  been 
some  possible  road  for  him  throughout  this  trouble- 
some world ;  but  a  man,  alas !  who  is  equally  at  the 
call  of  his  worse  and  better  instincts,  stands  among 
changing  events  without  foundation  or  resource. ' 


DOWNWARD    COURSE 

It  may  be  questionable  whether  any  marriage  could 
have  tamed  Burns ;  but  it  is  at  least  certain  that  there 
was  no  hope  for  him  in  the  marriage  he  contracted. 
He  did  right,  but  then  he  had  done  wrong  before;  it 
was,  as  I  said,  one  of  those  relations  in  life  which  it 
seems  equally  wrong  to  break  or  to  perpetuate.  He 
neither  loved  nor  respected  his  wife.  "God  knows," 
he  writes,  "my  choice  was  as  random  as  blind  man's 
buff."  He  consoles  himself  by  the  thought  that  he 
has  acted  kindly  to  her ;  that  she  "  has  the  most  sacred 
enthusiasm  of  attachment  to  him;"  that  she  has  a 
good  figure;    that  she  has  a  "  wood-note  wild,"  "her 

i  For  the  love  affairs  see,  in  particular,  Mr.  Scott  Douglas's 
edition  under  the  different  dates. 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


87 


voice  rising  with  ease  to  B  natural,"  no  less.  The 
effect  on  the  reader  is  one  of  un mingled  pity  for  both 
parties  concerned.  This  was  not  the  wife  who  (in  his 
own  words)  could  "  enter  into  his  favourite  studies  or 
relish  his  favourite  authors;"  this  was  not  even  a 
wife,  after  the  affair  of  the  marriage  lines,  in  whom  a 
husband  could  joy  to  put  his  trust.  Let  her  manage 
a  farm  with  sense,  let  her  voice  rise  to  B  natural  all  day 
long,  she  would  still  be  a  peasant  to  her  lettered  lord, 
and  an  object  of  pity  rather  than  of  equal  affection. 
She  could  now  be  faithful,  she  could  now  be  forgiv- 
ing, she  could  now  be  generous  even  to  a  pathetic 
and  touching  degree ;  but  coming  from  one  who  was 
unloved,  and  who  had  scarce  shown  herself  worthy 
of  the  sentiment,  these  were  all  virtues  thrown  away, 
which  could  neither  change  her  husband's  heart  nor 
affect  the  inherent  destiny  of  their  relation.  From 
the  outset,  it  was  a  marriage  that  had  no  root  in 
nature  ;  and  we  find  him,  ere  long,  lyrically  regretting 
Highland  Mary,  renewing  correspondence  with  Clarinda 
in  the  warmest  language,  on  doubtful  terms  with  Mrs. 
Riddel,  and  on  terms  unfortunately  beyond  any  ques- 
tion with  Anne  Park. 

Alas  !  this  was  not  the  only  ill  circumstance  in  his 
future.  He  had  been  idle  for  some  eighteen  menths, 
superintending  his  new  edition,  hanging  on  to  settle 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


with  the  publisher,  travelling  in  the  Highlands  with 
Willie  Nichol,  or  philandering  with  Mrs.  M'Lehose ; 
and  in  this  period  the  radical  part  of  the  man  had 
suffered  irremediable  hurt.  He  had  lost  his  habits  of 
industry,  and  formed  the  habit  of  pleasure.  Apologet- 
ical  biographers  assure  us  of  the  contrary ;  but  from 
the  first,  he  saw  and  recognised  the  danger  for  himself ; 
his  mind,  he  writes,  is  "  enervated  to  an  alarming 
degree''  by  idleness  and  dissipation;  and  again,  "my 
mind  has  been  vitiated  with  idleness."  It  never  fairly 
recovered.  To  business  he  could  bring  the  required 
diligence  and  attention  without  difficulty;  but  he  was 
thenceforward  incapable,  except  in  rare  instances,  of 
that  superior  effort  of  concentration  which  is  required 
for  serious  literary  work.  He  may  be  said,  indeed,  to 
have  worked  no  more,  and  only  amused  himself  with 
letters.  The  man  who  had  written  a  volume  of  master- 
pieces in  six  months,  during  the  remainder  of  his  life 
rarely  found  courage  for  any  more  sustained  effort 
than  a  song.  And  the  nature  of  the  songs  is  itself 
characteristic  of  these  idle  later  years ;  for  they  are 
often  as  polished  and  elaborate  as  his  earlier  works 
were  frank,  and  headlong,  and  colloquial ;  and  this 
sort  of  verbal  elaboration  in  short  flights  is,  for  a  man 
of  literary  turn,  simply  the  most  agreeable  of  pastimes. 
The    change    in    manner   coincides    exactly    with    the 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


89 


Edinburgh  visit.  In  17S6  he  had  written  the  Address 
to  a  Louse,  which  may  be  taken  as  an  extreme  instance 
of  the  first  manner;  and  already,  in  1787,  we  come 
upon  the  rosebud  pieces  to  Miss  Cruikshank,  which 
are  extreme  examples  of  the  second.  The  change  was, 
therefore,  the  direct  and  very  natural  consequence  of 
his  great  change  in  life;  but  it  is  not  the  less  typical 
of  his  loss  of  moral  courage  that  he  should  have  given 
up  all  larger  ventures,  nor  the  less  melancholy  that  a 
man  who  first  attacked  literature  with  a  hand  that 
seemed  capable  of  moving  mountains,  should  have 
spent  his  later  years  in  whittling  cherry-stones. 

Meanwhile,  the  farm  did  not  prosper ;  he  had  to  join 
to  it  the  salary  of  an  exciseman  ;  at  last  he  had  to  give 
it  up,  and  rely  altogether  on  the  latter  resource.  He 
was  an  active  officer;  and,  though  he  sometimes 
tempered  severity  with  mercy,  we  have  local  testi- 
mony oddly  representing  the  public  feeling  of  the 
period,  that,  while  "in  everything  else  he  was  a  per- 
fect gentleman,  when  they  met  with  anything  seizable 
he  was  no  better  than  any  other  gauger." 

There  is  but  one  manifestation  of  the  man  in  these 
last  years  which  need  delay  us  :  and  that  was  the  sudden 
interest  in  politics  which  arose  from  his  sympathy  with 
the  great  French  Revolution.  His  only  political  feel- 
ing had  been  hitherto  a  sentimental  Jacobitism,  not 


9° 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


more  or  less  respectable  than  that  of  Scott,  Aytoun, 
and  the  rest  of  what  George  Borrow  has  nicknamed 
the  "Charlie  over  the  water"  Scotchmen.  It  was  a 
sentiment  almost  entirely  literary  and  picturesque  in 
its  origin,  built  on  ballads  and  the  adventures  of  the 
Young  Chevalier;  and  in  Burns  it  is  the  more  excusa- 
ble, because  he  lay  out  of  the  way  of  active  politics  in 
his  youth.  With  the  great  French  Revolution,  some- 
thing living,  practical,  and  feasible  appeared  to  him 
for  the  first  time  in  this  realm  of  human  action.  The 
young  ploughman  who  had  desired  so  earnestly  to 
rise,  now  reached  out  his  sympathies  to  a  whole  nation 
animated  with  the  same  desire.  Already  in  1788  we 
find  the  old  Jacobitism  hand  in  hand  with  the  new 
popular  doctrine,  when,  in  a  letter  of  indignation 
against  the  zeal  of  a  Whig  clergyman,  he  writes : 
"I  daresay  the  American  Congress  in  1776  will  be 
allowed  to  be  as  able  and  as  enlightened  as  the  Eng- 
lish Convention  was  in  1688;  and  that  their  posterity 
will  celebrate  the  centenary  of  their  deliverance  from 
us,  as  duly  and  sincerely  as  we  do  ours  from  the 
oppressive  measures  of  the  wrong-headed  House  of 
Stuart."  As  time  wore  on,  his  sentiments  grew  more 
pronounced  and  even  violent ;  but  there  was  a  basis 
of  sense  and  generous  feeling  to  his  hottest  excess. 
What  he  asked  was  a  fair  chance  for  the  individual  in 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


91 


life ;  an  open  road  to  success  and  distinction  for  all 
classes  of  men.  It  was  in  the  same  spirit  that  he  had 
helped  to  found  a  public  library  in  the  parish  where 
his  farm  was  situated,  and  that  he  sang  his  fervent 
snatches  against  tyranny  and  tyrants.  Witness,  were 
it  alone,  this  verse:  — 

"  Here  's  freedom  to  him  that  wad  read, 

Here  's  freedom  to  him  that  wad  write ; 

There  's  nane  ever  feared  that  the  truth  should  be  heard 

But  them  wham  the  truth  wad  indite." 


Yet  his  enthusiasm  for  the  cause  was  scarce  guided 
by  wisdom.  Many  stories  are  preserved  of  the  bitter 
and  unwise  words  he  used  in  country  coteries;  how  he 
proposed  Washington's  health  as  an  amendment  to 
Pitt's,  gave  as  a  toast  "  the  last  verse  of  the  last 
chapter  of  Kings,"  and  celebrated  Dumouriez  in  a 
doggrel  impromptu  full  of  ridicule  and  hate.  Now 
his  sympathies  would  inspire  him  with  Scots,  wha  hae ; 
now  involve  him  in  a  drunken  broil  with  a  loyal  officer, 
and  consequent  apologies  and  explanations,  hard  to 
offer  for  a  man  of  Burns's  stomach.  Nor  was  this  the 
front  of  his  offending.  On  February  27, 1792,  he  took 
part  in  the  capture  of  an  armed  smuggler,  bought  at 
the  subsequent  sale  four  carronades,  and  despatched 
them  with  a  letter  to  the  French  Assembly.     Letter 


92 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


and  guns  were  stopped  at  Dover  by  the  English 
officials  ;  there  was  trouble  for  Burns  with  his  superi- 
ors ;  he  was  reminded  firmly,  however  delicately,  that, 
as  a  paid  official,  it  was  his  duty  to  obey  and  to  be 
silent;  and  all  the  blood  of  this  poor,  proud,  and 
falling  man  must  have  rushed  to  his  head  at  the 
humiliation.  His  letter  to  Mr.  Erskine,  subsequently 
Earl  of  Mar,  testifies,  in  its  turgid,  turbulent  phrases, 
to  a  perfect  passion  of  alarmed  self-respect  and  vanity. 
He  had  been  muzzled,  and  muzzled,  when  all  was  said, 
by  his  paltry  salary  as  an  exciseman ;  alas  !  had  he  not 
a  family  to  keep  ?  Already,  he  wrote,  he  looked  for- 
ward to  some  such  judgment  from  a  hackney  scribbler 
as  this:  "Burns,  notwithstanding  the  fanfaronnade 
of  independence  to  be  found  in  his  works,  and  after 
having  been  held  forth  to  view  and  to  public  estima- 
tion as  a  man  of  some  genius,  yet,  quite  destitute 
of  resources  within  himself  to  support  his  borrowed 
dignity,  he  dwindled  into  a  paltry  exciseman,  and 
shrunk  out  the  rest  of  his  insignificant  existence  in 
the  meanest  of  pursuits,  and  among  the  vilest  of  man- 
kind." And  then  on  he  goes,  in  a  style  of  rhodomon- 
tade,  but  filled  with  living  indignation,  to  declare  his 
right  to  a  political  opinion,  and  his  willingness  to  shed 
his  blood  for  the  political  birthright  of  his  sons.  Poor, 
perturbed  spirit !  he  was  indeed  exercised  in  vain  ;  those 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


93 


who  share  and  those  who  differ  from  his  sentiments 
about  the  Revolution,  alike  understand  and  sympathise 
with  him  in  this  painful  strait;  for  poetry  and  human 
manhood  are  lasting  like  the  race,  and  politics,  which 
are  but  a  wrongful  striving  after  right,  pass  and  change 
from  year  to  year  and  age  to  age.  The  Twa  Dogs  has 
already  outlasted  the  constitution  of  Sieyes  and  the 
policy  of  the  Whigs ;  and  Burns  is  better  known 
among  English-speaking  races  than  either  Pitt  or  Fox. 
Meanwhile,  whether  as  a  man,  a  husband,  or  a  poet, 
his  steps  led  downward.  He  knew,  knew  bitterly,  that 
the  best  was  out  of  him ;  he  refused  to  make  another 
volume,  for  he  felt  that  it  would  be  a  disappointment ; 
he  grew  petulantly  alive  to  criticism,  unless  he  was 
sure  it  reached  him  from  a  friend.  For  his  songs,  he 
would  take  nothing;  they  were  all  that  he  could  do; 
the  proposed  Scotch  play,  the  proposed  series  of 
Scotch  tales  in  verse,  all  had  gone  to  water;  and  in  a 
fling  of  pain  and  disappointment,  which  is  surely  noble 
with  the  nobility  of  a  viking,  he  would  rather  stoop 
to  borrow  than  to  accept  money  for  these  last  and 
inadequate  efforts  of  his  muse.  And  this  desperate 
abnegation  rises  at  times  near  to  the  height  of  mad- 
ness; as  when  he  pretended  that  he  had  not  written, 
but  only  found  and  published,  his  immortal  A  it  Id  Lang 
Syne.     In  the  same  spirit  he  became  more  scrupulous 


94 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


as  an  artist ;  he  was  doing  so  little,  he  would  fain  do 
that  little  well;  and  about  two  months  before  his 
death,  he  asked  Thomson  to  send  back  all  his  manu- 
scripts for  revisal,  saying  that  he  would  rather  write 
five  songs  to  his  taste  than  twice  that  number  other- 
wise. The  battle  of  his  life  was  lost ;  in  forlorn  efforts 
to  do  well,  in  desperate  submissions  to  evil,  the  last 
years  flew  by.  His  temper  is  dark  and  explosive, 
launching  epigrams,  quarrelling  with  his  friends,  jeal- 
ous of  young  puppy  officers.  He  tries  to  be  a  good 
father;  he  boasts  himself  a  libertine.  Sick,  sad,  and 
jaded,  he  can  refuse  no  occasion  of  temporary  pleasure, 
no  opportunity  to  shine  ;  and  he  who  had  once  refused 
the  invitations  of  lords  and  ladies  is  now  whistled  to  the 
inn  by  any  curious  stranger.  His  death  (July  21,  1796), 
in  his  thirty -seventh  year,  was  indeed  a  kindly  dispen- 
sation. It  is  the  fashion  to  say  he  died  of  drink; 
many  a  man  has  drunk  more  and  yet  lived  with  a 
reputation,  and  reached  a  good  age.  That  drink  and 
debauchery  helped  to  destroy  his  constitution,  and 
were  the  means  of  his  unconscious  suicide,  is  doubtless 
true;  but  he  had  failed  in  life,  had  lost  his  power  of 
work,  and  was  already  married  to  the  poor,  unworthy, 
patient  Jean,  before  he  had  shown  his  inclination  to 
convivial  nights,  or  at  least  before  that  inclination 
had  become    dangerous    either  to   his  health   or   his 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


95 


self-respect.  He  had  trifled  with  life,  and  must  pay  the 
penalty.  He  had  chosen  to  be  Don  Juan,  he  had 
grasped  at  temporary  pleasures,  and  substantial  happi- 
ness and  solid  industry  had  passed  him  by.  He  died 
of  being  Robert  Burns,  and  there  is  no  levity  in  such 
a  statement  of  the  case ;  for  shall  we  not,  one  and  all> 
deserve  a  similar  epitaph  ? 


The  somewhat  cruel  necessity  which  has  lain  upon 
me  throughout  this  paper  only  to  touch  upon  those 
points  in  the  life  of  Burns  where  correction  or  amplifi- 
cation seemed  desirable,  leaves  me  little  opportunity 
to  speak  of  the  works  which  have  made  his  name  so 
famous.  Yet,  even  here,  a  few  observations  seem 
necessary. 

At  the  time  when  the  poet  made  his  appearance  and 
great  first  success,  his  work  was  remarkable  in  two 
ways.  For,  first,  in  an  age  when  poetry  had  become 
abstract  and  conventional,  instead  of  continuing  to 
deal  with  shepherds,  thunderstorms,  and  personifica- 
tions, he  dealt  with  the  actual  circumstances  of  his 
life,  however  matter-of-fact  and  sordid  these  might  be. 
And,  second,  in  a  time  when  English  versification  was 
particularly  stiff,  lame,  and  feeble,  and  words  were 
used  with    ultra-academical  timidity,  he  wrote  verses 


96 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


that  were  easy,  racy,  graphic,  and  forcible,  and  used 
language  with  absolute  tact  and  courage  as  it  seemed 
most  fit  to  give  a  clear  impression.  If  you  take  even 
those  English  authors  whom  we  know  Burns  to  have 
most  admired  and  studied,  you  will  see  at  once  that  he 
owed  them  nothing  but  a  warning.  Take  Shenstone, 
for  instance,  and  watch  that  elegant  author  as  he  tries 
to  grapple  with  the  facts  of  life.  He  has  a  description, 
I  remember,  of  a  gentleman  engaged  in  sliding  or  walk- 
ing on  thin  ice,  which  is  a  little  miracle  of  incompetence. 
You  see  my  memory  fails  me,  and  I  positively  cannot 
recollect  whether  his  hero  was  sliding  or  walking ;  as 
though  a  writer  should  describe  a  skirmish,  and  the 
reader,  at  the  end,  be  still  uncertain  whether  it  were  a 
charge  of  cavalry  or  a  slow  and  stubborn  advance  of 
foot.  There  could  be  no  such  ambiguity  in  Burns ; 
his  work  is  at  the  opposite  pole  from  such  indefinite 
and  stammering  performances;  and  a  whole  lifetime 
passed  in  the  study  of  Shenstone  would  only  lead  a 
man  fjurther  and  further  from  writing  the  Address  to  a 
Louse.  Yet  Burns,  like  most  great  artists,  proceeded 
from  a  school  and  continued  a  tradition  ;  only  the 
school  and  tradition  were  Scotch,  and  not  English. 
While  the  English  language  was  becoming  daily  more 
pedantic  and  inflexible,  and  English  letters  more  colour- 
less and  slack,  there  was  another  dialect  in  the  sister 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


97 


country,  and  a  different  school  of  poetry  tracing  its 
descent,  through  King  James  I,  from  Chaucer.  The 
dialect  alone  accounts  for  much ;  for  it  was  then 
written  colloquially,  which  kept  it  fresh  and  supple ; 
and,  although  not  shaped  for  heroic  flights,  it  was  a 
direct  and  vivid  medium  for  all  that  had  to  do  with 
social  life.  Hence,  whenever  Scotch  poets  left  their 
laborious  imitations  of  bad  English  verses,  and  fell 
back  on  their  own  dialect,  their  style  would  kindle, 
and  they  would  write  of  their  convivial  and  somewhat 
gross  existences  with  pith  and  point.  In  Ramsay,  and 
far  more  in  the  poor  lad  Fergusson,  there  was  mettle, 
humour,  literary  courage,  and  a  power  of  saying  what 
they  wished  to  say  definitely  and  brightly,  which  in 
the  latter  case  should  have  justified  great  anticipa- 
tions. Had  Burns  died  at  the  same  age  as  Fergusson, 
he  would  have  left  us  literally  nothing  worth  remark. 
To  Ramsay  and  to  Fergusson,  then,  he  was  indebted 
in  a  very  uncommon  degree,  not  only  following  their 
tradition  and  using  their  measures,  but  directly  and 
avowedly  imitating  their  pieces.  The  same  tendency 
to  borrow  a  hint,  to  work  on  some  one  else's  founda- 
tion, is  notable  in  Burns  from  first  to  last,  in  the  period 
of  song-writing  as  well  as  in  that  of  the  early  poems ; 
and  strikes  one  oddly  in  a  man  of  such  deep  origin- 
ality, who  left  so  strong  a  print  on  all  he  touched,  and 


98 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


whose  work  is  so  greatly  distinguished  by  that  charac- 
ter of  "inevitability"  which  Wordsworth  denied  to 
Goethe. 

When  we  remember  Burns's  obligations  to  his  pred- 
ecessors, we  must  never  forget  his  immense  advances 
on  them.  They  had  already  "  discovered "  nature ; 
but  Burns  discovered  poetry  —  a  higher  and  more 
intense  way  of  thinking  of  the  things  that  go  to  make 
up  nature,  a  higher  and  more  ideal  key  of  words  in 
which  to  speak  of  them.  Ramsay  and  Fergusson 
excelled  at  making  a  popular  —  or  shall  we  say  vulgar 
—  sort  of  society  verses,  comical  and  prosaic,  written, 
you  would  say,  in  taverns  while  a  supper  party  waited 
for  its  laureate's  word ;  but  on  the  appearance  of 
Burns,  this  coarse  and  laughing  literature  was  touched 
to  finer  issues,  and  learned  gravity  of  thought  and 
natural  pathos. 

What  he  had  gained  from  his  predecessors  was  a 
direct,  speaking  style,  and  to  walk  on  his  own  feet 
instead  of  on  academical  stilts.  There  was  never  a 
man  of  letters  with  more  absolute  command  of  his 
means;  and  we  may  say  of  him,  without  excess,  that 
his  style  was  his  slave.  Hence  that  energy  of  epithet, 
so  concise  and  telling,  that  a  foreigner  is  tempted  to 
explain  it  by  some  special  richness  or  aptitude  in  the 
dialect  he  wrote.     Hence  that  Homeric  justice  and 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


99 


completeness  of  description  which  gives  us  the  very 
physiognomy  of  nature,  in  body  and  detail,  as  nature 
is.  Hence,  too,  the  unbroken  literary  quality  of  his 
best  pieces,  which  keeps  him  from  any  slip  into  the 
weariful  trade  of  word-painting,  and  presents  every- 
thing, as  everything  should  be  presented  by  the  art  of 
words,  in  a  clear,  continuous  medium  of  thought. 
Principal  Shairp,  for  instance,  gives  us  a  paraphrase 
of  one  tough  verse  of  the  original ;  and  for  those  who 
know  the  Greek  poets  only  by  paraphrase,  this  has 
the  very  quality  they  are  accustomed  to  look  for  and 
admire  in  Greek.  The  contemporaries  of  Burns  were 
surprised  that  he  should  visit  so  many  celebrated 
mountains  and  waterfalls,  and  not  seize  the  opportun- 
ity to  make  a  poem.  Indeed,  it  is  not  for  those  who 
have  a  true  command  of  the  art  of  words,  but  for 
peddling,  professional  amateurs,  that  these  pointed 
occasions  are  most  useful  and  inspiring.  As  those 
who  speak  French  imperfectly  are  glad  to  dwell  on 
any  topic  they  may  have  talked  upon  or  heard  others 
talk  upon  before,  because  they  know  appropriate 
words  for  it  in  French,  so  the  dabbler  in  verse  rejoices 
to  behold  a  waterfall,  because  he  has  learned  the  senti- 
ment and  knows  appropriate  words  for  it  in  poetry. 
But  the  dialect  of  Burns  was  fitted  to  deal  with  any 
subject;    and    whether    it    was    a    stormy    night,    a 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


shepherd's  collie,  a  sheep  struggling  in  the  snow,  the 
conduct  of  cowardly  soldiers  in  the  field,  the  gait  and 
cogitations  of  a  drunken  man,  or  only  a  village  cock- 
crow in  the  morning,  he  could  find  language  to  give  it 
freshness,  body,  and  relief.  He  was  always  ready  to 
borrow  the  hint  of  a  design,  as  though  he  had  a  diffi- 
culty in  commencing  —  a  difficulty,  let  us  say,  in 
choosing  a  subject  out  of  a  world  which  seemed  all 
equally  living  and  significant  to  him;  but  once  he  had 
the  subject  chosen,  he  could  cope  with  nature  single- 
handed,  and  make  every  stroke  a  triumph.  Again, 
his  absolute  mastery  in  his  art  enabled  him  to  express 
each  and  all  of  his  different  humours,  and  to  pass 
smoothly  and  congruously  from  one  to  another. 
Many  men  invent  a  dialect  for  only  one  side  of  their 
nature  —  perhaps  their  pathos  or  their  humour,  or 
delicacy  of  their  senses  —  and,  for  lack  of  a  medium, 
leave  all  the  others  unexpressed.  You  meet  such  an 
one,  and  find  him  in  conversation  full  of  thought, 
feeling,  and  experience,  which  he  has  lacked  the  art 
to  employ  in  his  writings.  But  Burns  was  not  thus 
hampered  in  the  practice  of  the  literary  art ;  he  could 
throw  the  whole  weight  of  his  nature  into  his  work, 
and  impregnate  it  from  end  to  end.  If  Doctor  John- 
son, that  stilted  and  accomplished  stylist,  had  lacked 
the  sacred  Boswell,  what  should  we  have  known  of 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


him  ?  and  how  should  we  have  delighted  in  his 
acquaintance  as  we  do  ?  Those  who  spoke  with  Bums 
tell  us  how  much  we  have  lost  who  did  not.  But  I 
think  they  exaggerate  their  privilege :  I  think  we  have 
the  whole  Burns  in  our  possession  set  forth  in  his 
consummate  verses. 

It  was  by  his  style,  and  not  by  his  matter,  that  he 
affected  Wordsworth  and  the  world.  There  is,  indeed, 
only  one  merit  worth  considering  in  a  man  of  letters  — 
that  he  should  write  well ;  and  only  one  damning  fault 
—  that  he  should  write  ill.  We  are  little  the  better 
for  the  reflections  of  the  sailor's  parrot  in  the  story. 
And  so,  if  Burns  helped  to  change  the  course  of  liter- 
ary history,  it  was  by  his  frank,  direct,  and  masterly 
utterance,  and  not  by  his  homely  choice  of  subjects. 
That  was  imposed  upon  him,  not  chosen  upon  a 
principle.  He  wrote  from  his  own  experience,  because 
it  was  his  nature  so  to  do,  and  the  tradition  of  the 
school  from  which  he  proceeded  was  fortunately  not 
opposed  to  homely  subjects.  But  to  these  homely 
subjects  he  communicated  the  rich  commentary  of  his 
nature;  they  were  all  steeped  in  Burns;  and  they 
interest  us  not  in  themselves,  but  because  they  have 
been  passed  through  the  spirit  of  so  genuine  and 
vigorous  a  man.  Such  is  the  stamp  of  living  literature  ; 
and  there  was  never  any  more  alive  than  that  of  Burns. 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


What  a  gust  of  sympathy  there  is  in  him  sometimes 
flowing  out  in  byways  hitherto  unused,  upon  mice,  and 
flowers,  and  the  devil  himself;  sometimes  speaking 
plainly  between  human  hearts;  sometimes  ringing  out 
in  exultation  like  a  peal  of  bells !  When  we  compare 
the  Farmer's  Sahrfation  to  His  Auld  Mare  Maggie, 
with  the  clever  and  inhumane  production  of  half  a 
century  earlier,  The  Auld  Alan's  Mare  ys  dead,  we  see 
in  a  nutshell  the  spirit  of  the  change  introduced  by 
Burns.  And  as  to  its  manner,  who  that  has  read  it 
can  forget  how  the  collie,  Luath,  in  the  Twa  Dogs, 
describes  and  enters  into  the  merry-making  in  the 
cottage  ? 

"The  luntin'  pipe  an'  sneeshin'  mill 
Are  handed  round  wi'  richt  guid  will ; 
The  canty  auld  folks  crackin'  crouse, 
The  young  anes  rantin'  through  the  house  — 
My  heart  has  been  sae  fain  to  see  them 
That  I  for  joy  hae  barkit  wi'  them." 

It  was  this  ardent  power  of  sympathy  that  was  fatal 
to  so  many  women,  and,  through  Jean  Armour,  to 
himself  at  last.  His  humour  comes  from  him  in  a 
stream  so  deep  and  easy  that  I  will  venture  to  call  him 
the  best  of  humorous  poets.  He  turns  about  in  the 
midst  to  utter  a  noble  sentiment  or  a  trenchant 
remark  on  human  life,  and  the  style  changes  and  rises 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


103 


to  the  occasion.  I  think  it  is  Principal  Shairp  who 
says,  happily,  that  Burns  would  have  been  no  Scotch- 
man if  he  had  not  loved  to  moralise ;  neither,  may  we 
add,  would  he  have  been  his  father's  son ;  but  (what 
is  worthy  of  note)  his  moralisings  are  to  a  large  extent 
the  moral  of  his  own  career.  He  was  among  the  least 
impersonal  of  artists.  Except  in  the  Jolly  Beggars,  he 
shows  no  gleam  of  dramatic  instinct.  Mr.  Carlyle  has 
complained  that  Tarn  d1  Shanter  is,  from  the  absence 
of  this  quality,  only  a  picturesque  and  external  piece  of 
work ;  and  I  may  add  that  in  the  Twa  Dogs  it  is  pre- 
cisely in  the  infringement  of  dramatic  propriety  that  a 
great  deal  of  the  humour  of  the  speeches  depends  for 
its  existence  and  effect.  Indeed,  Burns  was  so  full  of 
his  identity  that  it  breaks  forth  on  every  page ;  and 
there  is  scarce  an  appropriate  remark  either  in  praise  or 
blame  of  his  own  conduct,  but  he  has  put  it  himself 
into  verse.  Alasl  for  the  tenor  of  these  remarks! 
They  are,  indeed,  his  own  pitiful  apology  for  such  a 
marred  existence  and  talents  so  misused  and  stunted; 
and  they  seem  to  prove  forever  how  small  a  part  is 
played  by  reason  in  the  conduct  of  man's  affairs. 
Here  was  one,  at  least,  who  with  unfailing  judgment 
predicted  his  own  fate ;  yet  his  knowledge  could  not 
avail  him,  and  with  open  eyes  he  must  fulfil  his  tragic 
destiny.     Ten  years  before  the  end  he  had  written  his 


io4 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


epitaph  ;  and  neither  subsequent  events,  nor  the  critical 
eyes  of  posterity,  have  shown  us  a  word  in  it  to  alter. 
And,  lastly,  has  he  not  put  in  for  himself  the  last 
unanswerable  plea  ?  — 

"  Then  gently  scan  your  brother  man, 

Still  gentler  sister  woman  ; 
Though  they  may  gang  a  kennin  wrang, 

To  step  aside  is  human  : 
One  point  must  still  be  greatly  dark " 

One?  Alas!  I  fear  every  man  and  woman  of  us  is 
"  greatly  dark  "  to  all  their  neighbours,  from  the  day 
of  birth  until  death  removes  them,  in  their  greatest 
virtues  as  well  as  in  their  saddest  faults ;  and  we,  who 
have  been  trying  to  read  the  character  of  Burns  may 
take  home  the  lesson  and  be  gentle  in  our  thoughts. 


i  I  have  left  the  introductory  sentences  on  Principal  Shairp, 
partly  to  explain  my  own  paper,  which  was  merely  supplemental  to 
his  amiable  but  imperfect  book,  partly  because  that  book  appears 
to  me  truly  misleading  both  as  to  the  character  and  the  genius  of 
Burns.  This  seems  ungracious,  but  Mr.  Shairp  has  himself  to 
blame ;  so  good  a  Wordsworthian  was  out  of  character  upon  that 
stage. 

This  half  apology  apart,  nothing  more  falls  to  be  said  except 
upon  a  remark  called  forth  by  my  study  in  the  columns  of  a  literary 
Review.  The  exact  terms  in  which  that  sheet  disposed  of  Burns  I 
cannot  now  recall;  but  they  were  to  this  effect  —  that  Burns  was 
a  bad  man,  the  impure  vehicle  of  fine  verses  ;  and  that  this  was  the 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


io5 


view  to  which  all  criticism  tended.  Now  I  knew,  for  my  own  part, 
that  it  was  with  the  profoundest  pity,  but  with  a  growing  esteem, 
that  I  studied  the  man's  desperate  efforts  to  do  right ;  and  the 
more  I  reflected,  the  stranger  it  appeared  to  me  that  any  thinking 
being  should  feel  otherwise.  The  complete  letters  shed,  indeed,  a 
light  on  the  depths  to  which  Burns  had  sunk  in  his  character  of 
Don  Juan,  but  they  enhance  in  the  same  proportion  the  hopeless 
nobility  of  his  marrying  Jean.  That  I  ought  to  have  stated  this  more 
noisily  I  now  see  ;  but  that  any  one  should  fail  to  see  it  for  himself, 
is  to  me  a  thing  both  incomprehensible  and  worthy  of  open  scorn. 
If  Burns,  on  the  facts  dealt  with  in  this  study,  is  to  be  called  a  bad 
man,  I  question  very  much  whether  either  I  or  the  writer  in  the 
Review  have  ever  encountered  what  it  would  be  fair  to  call  a  good 
one.  All  have  some  fault.  The  fault  of  each  grinds  down  the 
hearts  of  those  about  him,  and  —  let  us  not  blink  the  truth  —  hurries 
both  him  and  them  into  the  grave.  And  when  we  find  a  man  per- 
severing indeed,  in  his  fault,  as  all  of  us  do,  and  openly  overtaken, 
as  not  all  of  us  are,  by  its  consequences,  to  gloss  the  matter  over, 
with  too  polite  biographers,  is  to  do  the  work  of  the  wrecker  dis- 
figuring beacons  on  a  perilous  seaboard  ;  but  to  call  him  bad,  with 
a  self-righteous  chuckle,  is  to  be  talking  in  one's  sleep  with  Heed- 
less and  Too-bold  in  the  arbour. 

Yet  it  is  undeniable  that  much  anger  and  distress  is  raised  in 
many  quarters  by  the  least  attempt  to  state  plainly,  what  every  one 
well  knows,  of  Burns's  profligacy,  and  of  the  fatal  consequences  of 
his  marriage.  And  for  this  there  are  perhaps  two  subsidiary 
reasons.  For,  first,  there  is,  in  our  drunken  land,  a  certain  privi- 
lege extended  to  drunkenness.  In  Scotland,  in  particular,  it  is 
almost  respectable,  above  all  when  compared  with  any  "  irregularity 
between  the  sexes."  The  selfishness  of  the  one,  so  much  more 
gross  in  essence,  is  so  much  less  immediately  conspicuous  in  its 


io6 


SOME    ASPECTS    OF    BURNS 


results  that  our  demiurgeous  Mrs.  Grundy  smiles  apologetically  on 
its  victims.  It  is  often  said — I  have  heard  it  with  these  ears  — 
that  "  drunkenness  may  lead  to  vice."  Now  I  did  not  think  it  at 
all  proved  that  Burns  was  what  is  called  a  drunkard  ;  and  I  was 
obliged  to  dwell  very  plainly  on  the  irregularity  and  the  too  fre- 
quent vanity  and  meanness  of  his  relations  to  women.  Hence,  in 
the  eyes  of  many,  my  study  was  a  step  towards  the  demonstration 
of  Burns's  radical  badness. 

But  second,  there  is  a  certain  class,  professors  of  that  low 
morality  so  greatly  more  distressing  than  the  better  sort  of  vice,  to 
whom  you  must  never  represent  an  act  that  was  virtuous  in  itself, 
as  attended  by  any  other  consequences  than  a  large  family  and 
fortune.  To  hint  that  Burns's  marriage  had  an  evil  influence  is, 
with  this  class,  to  deny  the  moral  law.  Yet  such  is  the  fact.  It 
was  bravely  done;  but  he  had  presumed  too  far  on  his  strength. 
One  after  another  the  lights  of  his  life  went  out,  and  he  fell  from 
circle  to  circle  to  the  dishonoured  sickbed  of  the  end.  And  surely 
for  any  one  that  has  a  thing  to  call  a  soul  he  shines  out  tenfold 
more  nobly  in  the  failure  of  that  frantic  effort  to  do  right,  than  if  he 
had  turned  on  his  heel  with  Worldly  Wiseman,  married  a  congenial 
spouse,  and  lived  orderly  and  died  reputably  an  old  man.  It  is  his 
chief  title  that  he  refrained  from  "  the  wrong  that  amendeth 
wrong."  But  the  common,  trashy  mind  of  our  generation  is  still 
aghast,  like  the  Jews  of  old,  at  any  word  of  an  unsuccessful  virtue. 
Job  has  been  written  and  read;  the  tower  of  Siloam  fell  nineteen 
hundred  years  ago  ;  yet  we  have  still  to  desire  a  little  Christianity, 
or,  failing  that,  a  little  even  of  that  rude,  old,  Norse  nobility  of 
soul,  which  saw  virtue  and  vice  alike  go  unrewarded,  and  yet  was 
not  shaken  in  its  faith. 


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